Europe Exhausting Itself Running from Boogeymen

Europe's high energy costs are driving increasing numbers of industries and large employers overseas. Most of Europe's high energy costs are caused by Europe's reflexive flight from inexpensive energy of the hydrocarbon and nuclear varieties.

High energy costs are emerging as an issue in Europe that is prompting debate, including questioning of the Continent’s clean energy initiatives. Over the past few years, Europe has spent tens of billions of euros in an effort to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.

“We embarked on a big transition to a low-carbon economy without taking into account the cost and without factoring in the competitive impact,” says Fabien Roques, head of European power and carbon at the energy consulting firm IHS CERA in Paris. “I think there will be a critical review of some of these policies in the next few years.” _NewYorkTimes

Carbon dioxide is boogeyman #1 for the European greens who control much of the continent's energy policy. But Europe's ineffectual attempts to reduce carbon emissions amount to suicidal self-flagellation and self-strangulation. It is all grand theatre, with the end result being self righteous self-immolation.

Boogeyman #2 is nuclear power. Germany is the poster boy of sacrificial self-castration in this regard.

The changes have been rapid. Nuclear power supplies 17 percent of the country’s energy needs, down from 23, while renewables have climbed from 20 to 25 percent in just months.

...Despite technological advances, wind, solar, hydro and other green energy sources still remain an unprofitable investment in a fair market. The way to encourage their exploitation is through a set of feed-in tariffs, a policy where energy companies are forced to buy electricity from green generators at a price set by the government (which is usually legislated to remain the same for two decades).

The German government has passed the cost of the payment from the energy companies to the consumer... This week, energy companies announced that the charge would go up by 47 percent for next year. The average Germany household will now pay €250 a year to sponsor green energy producers, four times more than in 2009. _RT

But green energy is expensive and unreliable. Which means that big industries whose profit margins depend upon the use of inexpensive energy, must move overseas -- and take their good paying jobs with them.

On Dec. 19, Voestalpine, an Austrian maker of high-quality steel for the auto industry, announced that it would build a plant in North America that would employ natural gas to reduce iron ore to a kind of raw iron that would then be used in the company's European blast furnaces.

...Energy-intensive industries like chemicals and steel are, if not closing European plants outright, looking toward places like the United States that have lower energy costs as they pursue new investments.

BASF, the German chemical giant, has been outspoken about the consequences of energy costs for competitiveness and is building a new plant in Louisiana.

“We Europeans are currently paying up to four or five times more for natural gas than the Americans,” Harald Schwager, a member of the executive board at BASF, said last month. “Energy efficiency alone will not allow us to compensate for this. Of course, that means increased competition for all the European manufacturing sites.” _NYT

Europeans have unwittingly handed their futures over to saboteurs in high places. Green government officials and their advisors are pushing European economies over a cliff, for the sake of faux environmental fear mongering. They are running from the energy boogeymen, and in the process are destroying the economic futures of their people.

Europeans are no longer living in a democracy, but are being controlled by a non-representative quasi-feudal system known as the European Union, based in Brussels. And the EU is essentially in thrall to the faux environmental power interests.

With such suicidal leadership, it is no wonder that demographic projections show most European populations rapidly withering away.

The future of Europe rests in the hands of her people, although Europeans have not been noted historically for understanding that fact. And there is very little time.

Global Coal Industry Booms: India and China Alone Adding 200 New Coal Plants

In the US, natural gas is replacing coal in new electricity generating power plants. As a result, CO2 emissions in the US have declined. In Europe, on the other hand, six times more coal units than natural gas units will be installed by 2015. You can imagine what that will do to Europe's carbon emissions.

But the true champions of coal are China and India, where 200 large new coal power plants will be built over the next few years. All of this while green faux environmentalists in western governments are working to institute ruinous carbon regulations on Europe, North America, and Oceania -- in the name of reducing global carbon emissions!

But another problem stood out. India relies on coal for 55 percent of its electric power and struggles to keep enough on hand.

Coal remains a critical component of the world’s energy supply despite its bad image. In China, demand for coal in 2010 resulted in a traffic jam 75 miles long caused by more than 10,000 trucks carrying supplies from Inner Mongolia. India is increasing coal imports.

So is Europe, as it takes advantage of lower coal prices in the United States. Higher-priced natural gas on the Continent is creating demand for more coal imports from the United States, where coal is taking a drubbing from less expensive natural gas.

...Coal is not subject to the vagaries of windless or sunless days, and can easily meet base-load demands of electricity consumers without interruption. So can nuclear power, but the nuclear industry is still reeling from the March 2011 disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant in Japan. Countries like Germany have turned away from nuclear reactors.

Global demand for coal is expected to grow to 8.9 billion tons by 2016 from 7.9 billion tons this year, with the bulk of new demand — about 700 million tons — coming from China, according to a Peabody Energy study. China is expected to add 240 gigawatts, the equivalent of adding about 160 new coal-fired plants to the 620 operating now, within four years. During that period, India will add an additional 70 gigawatts through more than 46 plants.

“If you poke your head outside of the U.S., coal-fired plants are being built left and right,” said William L. Burns, an energy analyst with Johnson Rice in New Orleans. “Coal is still the cheapest fuel source.” _NYT_via_GWPF

While the leadership of Europe, North America, and Oceania are suffering from carbon insanity, the leaders of China and India are not so deluded. They understand the critical importance of electrical power that does not turn off when the sun goes down or when the wind stops blowing. Modern industrial nations cannot run on the intermittent unreliable energy sources which Obama, Merkel, Gillard, and the others of similar mental turpitude tend to favour.

And please take note of the hypocrisy of the European governments that are willing to mortgage their economic and industrial futures on the backs of big wind and big solar for the sake of carbon reductions -- while at the same time building huge new coal power plants.

Modern societies cannot afford such stupid leaders as these, if they are to survive to reach the next level of abundance. But it seems that we may have reached a point of diminishing returns as far as democracy is concerned. When democracy becomes a rule of the mob which simply votes itself favours and sinecures, it is time for the more productive and competent to consider how to trim the fat and the dead weight.

As governments commit energy and industrial suicide via intermittent unreliables, and fall victim to carbon hysteria, their productive base tends to diminish. This increases instability in the overall system, and leads to chaotic shifts in foci of power and control.

Keep a close watch as things develop.

New Approach to Converting CO2 to Chemicals and Fuel

GCC
Z French team of scientists working with Thibault Cantat at the Institut Rayonnement Matière de Saclay in Gif-sur-Yvette have developed a new method to convert carbon dioxide into useful building blocks for chemical synthesis and fuels. Rather than taking one of two previous approaches to synthesise either chemicals or fuels, the team has taken a hybrid approach capable of producing either chemicals or fuels in one dual step.

In the diagonal method, the carbon dioxide is both reduced and functionalized in one step. This allows the synthesis of a much greater number of chemicals, directly from CO2. This reaction requires three things:

a reducing agent (e.g. a silane);

an organic molecule to be attached to the carbon atom of the carbon dioxide (e.g. an amine); and

a special catalyst that catalyzes both the reduction and the functionalization.

The successful catalyst is a special organic base consisting of a nitrogen-containing ring system. Cantat says that varying the reaction partners should allow the manufacture of a whole series of chemical compounds that are normally obtained from petrochemical feedstocks, such as formamide derivatives, which are important intermediates for both chemical and pharmaceutical industries. _GCC

The problem with this approach is twofold: 1. CO2 is not abundantly available in pure and concentrated form 2. Cheap methane is apt to be available for hundreds of years, and will supply alternative pathways to chemicals and fuels inexpensively.

Widespread public misconceptions of fuel shortages and carbon hysteria have led people to assume that the facts of the carbon cycle are different than they really are. As long as we are living in this age of popular delusion -- fueled by politics, academia, and the media -- expect many more such ingenious solutions to non-existent problems.

But in the meantime, it is quite possible that the methods developed by the French team of scientists will find profitable niche applications.

Catalysts and Solvents: Making Everything Possible

While we like to dwell on more exotic technologies and scientific theories, it is the nuts and bolts of modern industry and industrial scale agriculture which keeps you safe, warm, dry, and well fed. Almost no one likes to think about catalysts and solvents, but the quality of those arcane, mundane, nitty-gritty ingredients of your hidden underworld, determines much of what you can do with yourself.

Some interesting developments in catalysts:

New, cheaper nickel-based catalysts may spark a fuels and chemicals revolution

Newer, cheaper, platinum-free catalysts may open the door to cheap fuel cells, and fuel cell automobiles

Cheap molybdenum catalysts may make electrolysis of water to hydrogen / oxygen cheap and practical

Nanotechnology advances add an extra dimension to progress in catalysts

Solvents are even more easily ignored in everyday discussion than catalysts -- except in the context of a faux environmental armageddon. But they are no less important to everyday life for all of that.

New ionic solvents likely to revolutionise oil sands industry -- making oil sands and heavy oils environmentally friendly and setting back peak oil decades.

Supercritical CO2 and steam are proving to be effective solvents for more and more processes.

The movement toward cleaner, cheaper, more sustainable and effective solvents is accelerating, just like the movement toward better catalysts. And those are just two of the basic foundations of modern life where marginal improvements can pay huge dividents in quality of life.

Paying attention to such things can provide amazing investment opportunities as well.

Hydrogen has Very Low Energy Density; But H2 Still has Value

It is clear from the table of energy densities below, that the energy from a nuclear reaction such as fission far outstrips energy from chemical reactions such as combustion. But since it is neither practical nor safe to place a fission reactor in every household, every town, or every motor vehicle, there will always be a place for combustion reaction energy.

What fuels of combustion are most practicable, according to their energy density? The table gives us a few ideas. We will tend to avoid hydrogen gas for motor vehicles which require any significant range of travel, for example. For stationary applications -- such as fuel cell CHP generators and backup -- H2 can be valuable.

But an even greater value for H2 is for use in industrial processes, such as in turning low value bio-molecules into high value hydrocarbons [eg Neste], and in the refining of sour crude oil, among many other high-value processes. In other words, H2 production for the chemicals and fuel refining industries could become a lucrative enterprise.

Another common gas likely to grow in demand in the microbial fuels industry is CO2. Not dilute CO2 as in the measly 0.04% CO2 in the atmosphere. No. Clean, concentrated CO2 reagent grade, suitable to be fed to microbes and biomass crops (such as seaweed and giant king grass farms). Imagine getting rich from supplying H2 and CO2 to synth-fuels industries!
Source for the table of energy densities below

Material	Volumetric	Gravimetric
Fission of U-235	4.7x1012 Wh/l	2.5x1010 Wh/kg
Boron	38,278 Wh/l	16361 Wh/kg
JP10 (dicyclopentadiene)	10,975 Wh/l	11,694
Diesel	10,942 Wh/l	13,762 Wh/kg
Gasoline	9,700 Wh/l	12,200 Wh/kg			$0.0814/kwh 11-2007
Black Coal solid =>CO2	9444 Wh/l	6667 Wh/kg
LNG	7,216 Wh/l	12,100 Wh/kg
Propane (liquid)	7,050 +/-450 Wh/l	13,900 Wh/kg
Black Coal Bulk =>CO2	6278 Wh/l	6667 Wh/kg
Ethanol	6,100 Wh/l	7,850 Wh/kg
hydrazine (Mono-propellant)	5,426 Wh/l	5,373 Wh/kg
Thermite Fe2O3(s) + 2Al(s) -> Al2O3(s) + 2Fe(s) (mono fuel)	5,114 Wh/l	1,111 Wh/kg
Methanol	4,600 Wh/l	6,400 Wh/kg
Ammonia	4,325 Wh/l	4,318 Wh/kg
Sodium Borohydride Theoretical Hydrogen battery real is about 40% efficient	7,314 Wh/l theoretical 2,925 Wh/l real	7,100 Wh/kg theoretical 2,840 Wh/kg real
Liquid H2	2,600 Wh/l	39,000† Wh/kg
Hydrogen Peroxide 100% (mono-propellant rocket fuel) Often used at 30% or 90% and correspondingly less dense. when used, not all decomposes consider this a maximum	1,187 Wh/l	813 Wh/kg
LiFePO4	970 Wh/l	439 Wh/kg	1000 ? method not specified..
Wood Varies with type of wood and moisture content	700 +/-200 Wh/l	3154 +/-1554 Wh/kg
150 Bar H2	405 Wh/l	39,000 † Wh/kg
Secondary Lithium - ion Polymer	300 Wh/l ??	130 - 1200 Wh/kg
Secondary Lithium-Ion	300 Wh/l	110 Wh/kg
Primary Zinc-Air	240 Wh/l 1000Wh/l ??Best?	300 Wh/kg 440Wh/kg>
Dry ice sublimation	248 Wh/l	159 Wh/kg
Primary Lithium Sulfur Dioxide	190 Wh/l	170 Wh/kg
Nickel Metal Hydride (not discounted for high discharge rates)	100 Wh/l	60 Wh/kg
Wood pellets (pelletizing energy subtracted?)	100 †† Wh/l	4,700 Wh/kg
Flywheel	210 Wh/l	120 Wh/kg
Ice to water	92.6 Wh/l	92.6 Wh/kg
Liquid N2	68 Wh/l	55 Wh/kg
Lead Acid Battery	40 Wh/l	25 Wh/kg	300		$1.58/kWh
Propane (Gas - 1 bar)	28.1 Wh/l	13,900 Wh/kg
Compressed Air	17 Wh/l	34 Wh/kg
STP H2	2.7 Wh/l	39,000 † Wh/kg
Boost cap	1.72 Wh/l	2.98 Wh/kg

Table Source

University of Washington scientists are devising ways to rev up H2 production using photosynthetic microbes.

As discussed previously, artificial photosynthesis methods (artificial leaves) also split water to produce H2 (and O2).

University of Minnesota researchers are using microbes to produce fuels with sunlight and CO2. In this case the microbes are splitting water to produce hydrogen, and fixing carbon from CO2 to build biomass and specific product. But the pathetically small amount of CO2 in the atmosphere will simply not do. They will need to buy lots and lots of pure CO2 -- perhaps from you?

BARD of Morrisville, PA, intends to hit the algal fuels market in a big and fast way! Assuming BARD spokespersons are honest in their claims, they will need a HUGE amount of CO2 to produce their algal fuels. Where will they get it? How much are they willing to pay?

Innovative Energy Inc. from the St. Louis, MO, neighborhood, manufactures gasifiers capable of taking any carbonaceous material and turning it into syngas -- to generate power and process heat. Of course, one of the components of syngas is H2. Tweaking the gasifier and feedstock can alter the composition of your syngas according to desired product -- for immediate combustion or for later use in catalytic synthesis of fuels and chemicals.

University of Connecticut researchers have developed continuous process reactors to quickly and efficiently separate glycerine from biodiesel in biodiesel processing plants. But of course a better way of making biodiesel (besides esterification) is via the use of hydrotreating with H2 -- if you have the H2!

Highmark Renewables Research of Canada is developing an anaerobic digester to be used in conjunction with multiple other bio-reactors for producing multiple bio-fuels. Of course, this is the way of the future in biofuels and bioreactor companies -- combine and conquer.

While you may not see the same company owning the full cluster of diverse and complementary bioreactors, you will begin to see more co-location of various types of bioreactors and feedstock pre-processing, processing, refining, and more sophisticated catalytic synthesis.

And always, you will find H2 and CO2 to be in high demand. Remember in the California gold rush, when the people who made the most money were those who provided the miners with both the dry goods and the wet goods which the miners needed and craved? Most of the miners themselves went bankrupt.

Let that be a lesson to you. ;-)

What Good is an Atmospheric CO2 Vacuum Cleaner?

Carbon dioxide is commonly used as a raw material for production of various chemicals; as a working material in fire extinguishing systems; for carbonation of soft drinks; for freezing of food products such as poultry, meats, vegetables and fruit; for chilling of meats prior to grinding; for refrigeration and maintenance of ideal atmospheric conditions during transportation of food products to market; for enhancement of oil recovery from oil wells; and for treatment of alkaline water. _CO2

CO2_Vaccuum_Cleaner?
CO2 is a valuable industrial chemical, with many valuable uses. Carbon dioxide is extracted economically from many industrial processes, for purposes of re-use. One important future use of industrial CO2 will be for algae food. Well-fed algae can be used to make chemicals, foods, fuels, and dozens of other products.

Industry is developing better means to grow and separate algae, and to extract algal oil from algae, once the algae have turned the tasty CO2 into oils:

The Diversified Technologies' PEF Pre-Treatment of Algae for Oil Extraction Process applies 10-30 kV/cm electric pulses for 2 to 20 microseconds to an algal slurry which rupture the cell walls to release biodiesel compounds such as methyl hexadecanoate. The firm estimates this low energy process of lysing algae cells would account for about $0.10/gal. of the price of algae-derived biofuel compared to $1.75/gal. for conventional drying.

In-line and fully scalable to high production volumes, the Diversified Technologies' PEF Pre-Treatment of Algae for Oil Extraction Process consists of a chamber where the algal slurry is pumped into and treated along with a rack housing a power supply and pulse modulator. The pulsed electric field process has been proven in food disinfection and wastewater processing, where it has been in commercial use for several years. _Diversified_via_BD

Of course it is more economical to vacuum CO2 out of industrial gas effluent than to extract CO2 from the atmosphere -- which is only 0.04% CO2!

Plants have been extracting CO2 from the atmosphere for hundreds of millions of years, and believe me, they like as much CO2 as they can get! Improved methods for turning plant biomass into fuels is one way humans can indirectly take advantage of atmospheric CO2 -- and re-cycle their own industrial CO2 production.

Carbon hysterics are people who panic at the thought of the least little bit of CO2 in the atmosphere. Despite the best scientific evidence pointing toward natural chaotic cycles of climate occurring for the past billions of years, carbon hysterics worry that CO2 will destroy the planet. Of course if you have become an extremist carbon hysteric -- as many employees of the new NASA have become -- you may go so far as to propose a nuclear war in order to neutralise the effect of 0.04% CO2 in the atmosphere!

A nuclear war to combat "global warming?" With all the famine, disease, death, and revolution which that would bring, perhaps that is what leftist faux environmentalists have been talking about when they discuss the great dieoff.orgy? It may be the only way that the lefty-Luddite predictions of doom can be brought to pass. And I always thought lefty faux enviros where anti-nuclear!

North American Oil Boom Moves into Manitoba

"Peak oil in North America is likely not to be peak" given $90 per barrel prices and new technology that makes it easier to recover oil, he [Peter Tertzakian] said.

...Oil companies are adapting the same advanced drilling techniques that created the boom in shale gas: horizontal drilling and multistage hydraulic fracturing that allow them to break open the rocks at various points and capture the hydrocarbons trapped within.

The other key factor in the tight-oil boom is a high oil price, as North American crude is trading around $90 (U.S.) a barrel and international grades, near $100.

"High oil prices are definitely driving this thing," said Stephen Sonnenberg, a leading geologist at the Colorado School of Mines. "Gas prices are suppressed, oil prices are quite high and everybody is really excited about these tight oil plays." _Globe&Mail

The shale oil technology revolution is moving into Manitoba, boosting local economies there, just as it has in Alberta and Saskatchewan -- and in several US states as well.

In the Bakken formation, production is rising so fast there is no space in pipelines to bring the oil to market. Instead, it is being transported to refineries by rail and truck. Drilling companies have had to erect camps to house workers. _AP

Oil production is once again rising in North America -- despite the de facto Obama moratorium on offshore drilling.

Many informed energy experts believe that the US government under Obama has gotten itself far too involved in the energy picture -- to the point of instigating an underhanded form of "energy starvation."

The more the government gets involved in energy, the more expensive energy becomes and the less we produce here at home. The Department of Energy was created to reduce dependence on foreign oil.

...We have doubled imports since then. The constant drumbeat of "energy plans" pushed by politicians simply pick winners and losers in the energy business, rewarding political friends on both sides of the aisle. The less government is involved, the more consumers can make decisions for themselves. _MSNBC

Energy policies in Europe are even worse than in Obama's US. Big bets placed on wind and solar energy by European governments are beginning to hit their economies with a devastating back-bite. From the UK, to Italy, to Germany and Spain, to investors across the developed world, there is a dawning of awareness that neither wind nor solar are ready for prime time energy production. Such intermittent, unreliable, exorbitantly expensive, prone-to-failure energy sources never made sense for large scale on-grid production. Particularly when far more reliable nuclear reactor designs are available -- once Obama's fat and lazy-assed NRC gets around to certifying them.

The "energy crisis" is certainly more a failure of government than anything else, but there is another big problem feeding into the "crisis." A growing shortage of skilled manpower in the energy industries is a ticking timebomb for advanced industrial civilisations. The coming Idiocracy -- the dysgenic future trends of current demographics -- portends far greater problems for civilisation than any shortage of fuels or any possible hazards from marginally higher levels of the trace gas CO2 (only 0.04% of Earth's atmosphere).

Another CO2 to Fuels Approach, Using SOEC Electrolysis

In a paper published in the journal Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, researchers from Columbia University and the Risø National Laboratory for Sustainable Energy (Denmark) review the possible technological pathways for recycling CO2 into fuels using renewable or nuclear energy, considering three stages: CO2 capture; H2O and CO2 dissociation, and fuel synthesis.

The new review paper analyzes dissociation methods including thermolysis, thermochemical cycles, electrolysis, and photoelectrolysis of CO2 and/or H2O, and then identifies co-electrolyzing H2O and CO2 in high temperature solid oxide cells to yield syngas, and then producing gasoline or diesel from the syngas in a catalytic reactor (e.g. Fischer–Tropsch) as one of the most promising, feasible routes. _GCC

The authors claim that the process can be competitive with gasoline sold between US $2 and US $3 a gallon, depending upon the cost per kwh of electricity. In reality, for this process to be competitive, electricity would have to be extemely cheap -- which rules out wind and solar as power sources.

In the review, Grave et al. examine the status of the enabling technologies for each stage, with special focus on the various thermochemical, electrochemical and photochemical energy conversion technologies that could be used for dissociation of H2O and CO2, the stage with the highest energy consumption. They noted that combining more than one stage into a single unit is possible, but there may be benefits to optimizing each stage separately.

With feasible technology development and mass production of the process components, CO2-recycled hydrocarbon fuels can be produced at the scale needed to replace transportation fuels at a price competitive with more conventional fossil-derived hydrocarbons, especially if oil and CO2 sequestration costs are high. The potentially greater sustainability of CO2-recycled fuels over fossil or biomass derived fuels, as well as independence from the geographic and supply related issues of conventional fuels, could also give CO2-recycled fuels a market advantage.

—Graves et al _GCC

The image below is a fanciful representation of some EU bureaucrat's reality-disconnected daydream, but it provides a simplified and readily grasped summary of the underlying idea. As long as you know that wind power is much too unreliable and expensive to work in this scheme, and that atmospheric capture of CO2 is completely unworkable economically, you will be prepared to look at the images above for slightly more realistic approaches.

Al Fin analysts have concluded that the only way such a scheme could work in the near to mid-term future, would be to combine a plant that creates significant concentrated CO2 with a dedicated modular fission plant for electric power, adding the components for SOEC electrolysis and F-T synthesis. Each step must be proven individually, then in an ensemble pilot project.

For this type of project, theory is not enough to base a significant investment. All of the concepts must be proven individually, and then together, before attempting to scale up.

Carnival of Nuclear Energy #27 at NextBigFuture

Brian Wang hosts the 27th incarnation of his creation, the Blog Carnival of Nuclear Energy. Here is a short excerpt:

2. Nuclear green has Charles Forsberg's views on Generation IV nuclear costs." At the beginning of the 21st century, Charles Forsberg of ORNL and MIT proposed a hybrid molten salt cooled reactor that borrowed features from gas cooled reactors. The resultant reactor, Forsberg argued, would have a significantly lower cost than other Generation IV reactor designs.

3. Rod Adams at Atomic Insights has What keeps you up late at night? For me, tonight, it is the unholy alliance of natural gas, environmentalists and renewable energy advocates that are working hard to capture more market share from nuclear energy. They have lowered prices enough - for a while - to convince high level decision makers to slow down their nuclear ambitions.

This post provides a host of links that tie together a rather strange set of bedfellows who are excited about the often repeated story of a new abundance in natural gas. One aspect of the story of cheap gas prices into the distant future is often overlooked - Exxon Mobil and Chevron are investing tens of billions to purchase large blocks of natural gas production capacity. Do they know something about supply and demand?

4. A new twice a month energy blog about the making of PANDORA'S PROMISE has been launched on National Geographic. The first piece is on the IFR (Integral fast reactor).


5. Yes Vermont Yankee has Without Vermont Yankee, ISO-NE Predicts Possible Transmission Line Melting


The grid operator for New England earlier announced that "Vermont Yankee must stay in the 2013 forward energy auction." They recently translated this into English:the results of a recent study show transmission lines would be badly overloaded without Vermont Yankee. _NBF

Follow the link above for more carnival plus links to original articles.

Meanwhile in India, one of the country's top scientists declared that cold fusion is the best way to produce electrical power.

He will have the opportunity to prove his assertion over the next several years, no doubt. In science and industry -- unlike in politics, environmentalism, philosophy, and most of academia -- assertions are either proven or disproven by reality, eventually.

The Growing Hunger for Carbon Dioxide

Algenol
Human industry is building up a mighty hunger for CO2, the villainous greenhouse gas. It is becoming a problem to get enough of the stuff. In the graphic above, you can see the plans that Algenol is making -- to situate its algal farms next to Valero oil refineries, so as to siphon off the CO2 byproduct of the refinery to feed its algae. Other companies making similar plans include Ceres, and Joule.

The latest CO2 hungry process being discussed is the German project to use wind-generated electricity to produce methanol. Such a process would not be particularly efficient overall, but it would use up a lot of CO2 -- and Europeans are desperate to find a way to make their huge wind energy investments viable.

Carbon dioxide is at historically low levels in Earth's atmosphere -- if one understands the concept of "history" at all. Most of the plant and animal families that populate the planet evolved under conditions of higher CO2 levels -- sometimes massively higher levels. Life on land and in the sea thrives on high levels of CO2, and quickly converts the gas into protoplasm, cellulose, and calcium carbonate.

Faux environmentalist claims that CO2 is bringing a bio-holocaust to land and sea have no scientific basis -- aside from contrived theoretical models and a bit of statistical malpractise. Part of the problem in public perception is the muddled confusing of CO2 with genuine pollutants -- such as those produced by Chinese industries.

What we actually have, is a shortage of CO2. Trees and sea creatures would agree that the current levels of atmospheric CO2 are sub-optimal. Certainly human industrialists in many growing fields seeking to bypass fossil fuels feedstocks, would like access to cheap and abundant supplies of pure CO2.

Promising Reactions of Gasification: Adding More CO2

Enterprising researchers at Columbia University and ATK are increasing gasification efficiency by adding CO2 to gasifier mixtures at varying concentrations (between 25% and 40%). The supplemental CO2 also allows them to fine tune the resulting syngas mix. Use the graphic above to help you understand what the researchers are doing.

Castaldi and Butterman used a range of carbon dioxide (0 percent to 100 percent) and steam mixtures on about 50 different kinds of biomass, finding that between 25 percent and 40 percent carbon dioxide seemed optimal, depending on the process and desired end product. “Adding much more than 40 percent carbon dioxide in that process is only adding a diluent,” he says. Feedstocks such as beach grass, pine needles, poplar wood and municipal solid waste, along with coal, were gasified at temperatures of 25 to 1,000 degrees Celsius (77 to 1,832 degrees Fahrenheit) at rates of 1 to 100 degrees Celsius per minute in the range of carbon dioxide/steam mixtures, according to the study.

The increased efficiency occurs for two reasons. The first is because of carbon dioxide’s reactivity. “If it’s not reactive enough, like the steam, you form a residual that is very, very low in surface area, that’s nonporous,” Castaldi says. “And what happens is, as it reacts, it becomes more and more difficult to react.” He compares the reaction to a sponge, saying it’s crucial to absorb the reactive medium all the way through, not just on the surface. Steam reacts mostly on the surface, densifying the biomass and preventing it from absorbing more steam. But the carbon dioxide reacts at the right amount to not only continuously react with the biomass, but to keep pores open or even open them further, he says. The carbon dioxide enables the biomass to keep its sponge-like quality, or porosity, while steam collapses those pores, he says.

Another reason that carbon dioxide increases biomass gasification efficiency is the increased occurrence of the water-gas shift reaction: water and carbon monoxide reacting to form hydrogen and carbon dioxide. It works like this: as the mixture of steam and carbon dioxide goes over the biomass and gasifies it, the carbon dioxide reacts more than the steam, which means there is steam present that is not reacting with solid biomass, Castaldi explains. It’s left in the gas phase and as the carbon dioxide gasifies the biomass and makes carbon monoxide, that carbon monoxide goes into the gas phase and reacts with water via the water-gas shift reaction. The reaction is exothermic, meaning it releases heat, and the steam the carbon dioxide leaves behind increases that heat release, thereby increasing occurrence of the entire reaction, he says. “A system using carbon dioxide needs less energy because there’s an exothermic reaction that’s a little more engaged,” he says. The process does not use all carbon dioxide, Castaldi says, but about 30 percent. “It turns out that the energy needed to create syngas from steam and biomass is nearly equal to making syngas using all carbon dioxide and biomass,” he says of the reaction. But the difference is in the heat release.

In addition, some of the carbon dioxide input—between 20 percent and 50 percent of that 30 percent—is actually converted into carbon monoxide, Castaldi says. “So now I’m introducing a sufficient quantity of carbon dioxide that causes the process to actually utilize a good portion of it,” he says.

In this process, the input of carbon dioxide determines the ratio of hydrogen to carbon monoxide in the syngas. With more carbon dioxide, the ratio goes down, increasing carbon monoxide and decreasing hydrogen. Tweaking input can make desirable syngas compositions for different processes, such as turbine combustion, special chemicals production, Fischer-Tropsch for diesel fuels, and others, Castaldi says. _BiomassMag

Image Source

Basic information on gasification

Using concentrated CO2 is not free. Carbon dioxide makes up only 0.04% of the Earth's atmospheric gases. It takes work to concentrate such a dilute gas. It is becoming clearer that carbon sequestration from coal IGCC / CHP plants will double the cost of the eletricity produced. If industrial engineers can find a use for the CO2 which would return enough compensation to pay for the sequestration, then carbon sequestration would begin to make sense. But that is unlikely.

It is only political inertia and corruption that is driving the carbon hysteria of the worldwide "catastrophic anthropogenic global warming" bandwagon and carbon credit con and crusade. The science is slowly but inevitably turning away from the alarmist aspects of carbon hysteria. It is time for the people to put the government back in its place.

Carbon Sequestration is Overpriced and Unnecessary

Producing electricity using the gasification of coal, combined heat and power, and combined cycle power extraction, is a clean and viable method of using coal. But faux-environmentalists and dunderheaded politicians too often add inefficient and expensive carbon sequestration -- to no good purpose. Such incompetence only adds costs that are passed on to customers -- depressing the general economy.

What should our New York State and local leaders do? First, we could embrace clean coal technology. We make this too expensive by requiring carbon sequestration, a process by which carbon dioxide is recaptured and piped many miles away and stored underground. The green bent of our government mandates this incredibly expensive process in spite of all the controversy with global warming or in its newest guise, climate change.

The Marcellus Shale discovery is one of the most significant natural gas discoveries ever. Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia share this bounty with New York State. While those states enjoy the benefits of this discovery, we have our Department of Environmental Conservation figuring out how we can responsibly harvest this natural gas. Couldn’t we duplicate what’s being done in our neighboring states?

Lastly, we’re within 30 miles of one of the most successful hydroelectric plants in the world, the Niagara Power Project. Commercial customers such as One HSBC Center are legislatively excluded from accessing this very clean and cheap source of power. Instead we’re looking to invest a portion of the almost $300 million of annual profits from the Niagara Power Project in alternative energy sources. The plan is to place scads of windmills in lakes Erie and Ontario. If a static Peace Bridge design can be foiled by a bird, good luck winning over environmentalists and recreational boaters with this one!

There is no logical explanation why our electricity should cost 50 percent to 70 percent more than the national average. Regional assets like abundant hydropower and natural gas are denied us by our legislators and governor. The cost of electricity should be significantly less, not increasing.

_BuffaloNews

Unfortunately for the writer of the editorial, there is indeed a logical explanation why electricity in New York State and in other regions gored by green politics. Logically, green political activists wish to suppress economic growth. They believe that by doing so, they will take pressure off the environment.

But greens are far too stupid to understand that the worst economic devastation occurs in the areas of greatest poverty. Eastern Europe under the USSR was both impoverished and environmentally devastated. Rural and industrial areas of China are the world's most devastated areas -- and the vast masses of people are living in poverty. Impoverished third world people across the planet are deforesting their lands for firewood for cooking fires. Rivers become sewers and vacant lots become landfills. Poverty leads to environmental devastation.

Greens promote economic depression and poverty in a misguided attempt to help the planet --- but they are killing it instead. Widespread affluence leads to an appreciation of the environment, and a desire to preserve natural settings by using more economical substitutes for fuels and energy.

If you want

Peak Oil is for Idiots (Global Warming Too)

Methanol is an interesting fuel -- more energy-dense than the densest form of hydrogen, usable in combustion engines, in direct methanol fuel cells, and in "indirect" methanol fuel cells that use steam reforming to produce protons. Methanol can also be used in the production of biodiesel from vegetable oils. Methanol may even become the basis for a methanol economy, as a primary mobile energy source for transportation (instead of petroleum, ethanol, or hydrogen).

So isn't it fascinating that scientists in Singapore have discovered a relatively easy and efficient way of making methanol from CO2?

In the international chemistry journal Angewandte Chemie, the IBN researchers report that by using organocatalysts, they activated carbon dioxide in a mild and non-toxic process to produce methanol, a widely used industrial feedstock and clean-burning biofuel...

....The scientists made carbon dioxide react by using N-heterocyclic carbenes (NHCs), a novel organocatalyst. In contrast to heavy metal catalysts that contain toxic and unstable components, NHCs are stable, even in the presence of oxygen. Hence, the reaction with NHCs and carbon dioxide can take place under mild conditions in dry air.

The IBN scientists showed that only a small amount of NHC is required to induce carbon dioxide activity in a reaction...Hydrosilane, a combination of silica and hydrogen, is added to the NHC-activated carbon dioxide, and the product of this reaction is transformed into methanol by adding water through hydrolysis. _SciLive

You might even call it a CO2 economy, since the methanol will come from CO2. And how idiotic is it to worry about CO2 when it is becoming the very basis of your energy infrastructure? Don't forget that oil-producing algae thrive on very high levels of CO2. And how pathetic is it to worry about "peak oil" when no one will be using oil anyway? When everyone is using bioenergy, enhanced geothermal, space solar, and advanced nuclear energy instead of petrol?

Well, sure, you can make methanol from biomass quite easily as well, via either fermentation or thermochemical methods. Methane, methanol, ethanol, butanol, etc etc etc There is no reason ever to run out. In fact, as the technology improves, supplies will keep growing as long as there is demand.

Peak oil and global warming: two obsessions fit for assholes. The K-Y jelly will cost extra.

Converting CO2 to Methane With Nanotubes

Penn State U. researchers have devised arrays of titania nanotubes to convert atmospheric CO2 to CH4 and other hydrocarbons using sunlight.

The rate of carbon dioxide (CO2) conversion using this method is 20 times higher than that of previously published research. The work is described in the January 27, 2009, online edition of Nano Letters.

....This type of solar-based conversion process only works if a photocatalyst—a material that reacts with light—is used to convert the CO2 into hydrocarbons. A photocatalyst that utilizes the most solar energy possible is the best option.

One popular photocatalyst candidate for the job has been titanium dioxide, also called titania, because it can powerfully react with oxygen. But so far, researchers haven't been able to make titania perform adequately despite experimenting with a variety of forms, such as nanoparticles, pellets, and multi-layer films.

Grimes and his colleagues used arrays of titania nanotubes. They created the nanotubes using a technique that incorporates nitrogen into the nanotubes' structures, which the researchers initially thought would help increase the conversion rate (this turned out to be true only in a very limited capacity).

The process also yields a high total surface area compared to other forms of the material, a property that aids in the conversion. To further boost the process, the group scattered an ultra-thin layer of platinum and/or copper "cocatalyst" nanoparticles on the surface of the array. _PO

Not only will this method produce useful hydrocarbon fuels, but if the global climate cools much further, such nano-arrays could be distributed across the globe to boost atmospheric methane levels -- to trap more of the suns heat, and stave off excessive global cooling. We would need to be careful not to allow methane concentrations to reach explosive levels, however. ;-)

Algal Fuels, CO2 Into Fuel, etc.

A joint project between GreenFuel and Aurantia in Spain may be one of the first working commercial scale algae biofuels operations.

"We believe algae hold great promise for Spain as they can be harvested daily, rather than seasonally, use water very efficiently and do not require arable land like other crops," Rafael Naranjo, Aurantia Group's chief executive and chairman, said in a statement.

GreenFuel Technologies Corp. said it has successfully grown a variety of naturally occurring algae strains in Jerez using Holcim flue gases. The second phase of the project began with the successful inoculation and subsequent harvests of a prototype vertical thin-film algae-solar bioreactor.

The next phase involves building algae greenhouses and harvesting facilities. _Forbes

Meanwhile, California company Carbon Sciences says it has developed a viable way of producing renewable fuels "directly" from CO2.

The company says its "C02-to-Fuel" technology uses CO2 to create ethane, propane and methane, three run-of-the mill hydrocarbons used to make high-grade gasoline and other fuels. The key to the process is biocatalysis, a process where natural catalysts are used to perform chemical reactions. Biocatalysis is a more energy efficient and cost-effective way to break down CO2, making the possibility of a large-scale ramp up economically feasible.

The approach uses a low energy biocatalytic hydrolysis process that splits water molecules into hydrogen atoms and hydroxide ions, says Dr. Naveed Aslam, the company's chief technology officer and inventor of the process. The hydrogen is used to create hydrocarbons, while the free electrons in the hydroxide are used to fuel the biocatalytic process, he says. The process "is based on natural organic chemistry processes that occur in all living organisms where carbon atoms, extracted from CO2, and hydrogen atoms extracted from H2O, are combined to create hydrocarbon molecules using biocatalysts and small amounts of energy."

As for collecting the CO2, Carbon Sciences won't just erect a big filter in the sky and hope for the best. The idea is to set up shop alongside oil refineries and and coal plants and capture the CO2 such facilities generate.

Carbon Sciences isn't the only outfit seeking viable ways to recycle carbon dioxide. Scientists at Sandia National Laboratory have developed a way to use sunlight to convert CO2 into fuel. Newcastle University researchers can use CO2 to create chemical compounds called cyclic carbonates. The compounds are used in many solvents and also could be used as an additive to make gasoline burn more efficiently. _Wired

And be sure to check out yesterday's post at New Energy and Fuel, about the Italian Gasification project that may open the door to more efficient synfuel from gasification. A very nice elaboration by Brian Westenhaus.

I suspect that Mr. Fin would not think much of either of these new ventures. He would say, "wait and see what happens."

While I don't have the broad range of training and experience of a Mr. Al Fin, I do read very widely and have superior intelligence. I suspect that these ventures might be able to produce small amounts of fuel at a price several times higher than you would pay at the fuel pump. It is the idea they are peddling. Promises are easy, delivering the goods is hard.

That's the difference between a market economy and a political system. Politicians can promise anything the people want, and as long as voters believe the promises long enough to elect the politico, the politician is happy, for a while. Politics is the art of deceiving the voters. Those who survive the game for long periods of time have learned to maintain the deception, or have coopted public information sources to prostitute themselves for special favors.

In a market economy, a company must supply a product in a timely fashion and at a cost the customers are willing to pay.

Alice Finkel

Peak Oil: Meet the Raytheon Oil Shale Microwave

US defense contractor and electronics company Raytheon has developed oil extraction technology that may send "Peak Oil" packing, for a decade or two. At least, giant oil and gas developer Schlumberger thinks so:

Much as a microwave oven heats food, Raytheon Co.‘s (NYSE:RTN) technology relies on microwaves to generate underground heat and melt a waxy substance in the shale called kerogen so it can be converted into oil...Carbon dioxide heated and pressurized into a liquid form is then used to extract the oil from the rock and carry it to a well.

Raytheon and oil companies began exploring ways to extract oil from shale decades ago, but many efforts were shelved in the 1980s as oil prices and supplies stabilized. Some projects _ including Raytheon‘s _ were revived in recent years because of spiking prices, technological improvements and hopes of decreasing U.S. dependency on foreign oil....Most of the attention is focused on oil shale reserves scattered across U.S. federal lands in Colorado, Utah and southwest Wyoming _ an area estimated to contain up to 1.8 trillion barrels of oil trapped in shale, or three times the proven reserves of Saudi Arabia.

Oilweek

This technology can also be used for extracting oil from tar sands in Canada, and for extracting heavy oils.

The RF/CF combination is more economical and environmentally responsible than older oil shale extraction techniques as it uses less power, does not severely disrupt the landscape or leave behind residue that can enter groundwater supplies....For tar sands and heavy oil, the Raytheon process could yield 10 to 15 barrels of oil equivalent per barrel consumed, due to the lower heating temperatures required. When applied in tar sands, the combined RF/CF technology performs a mild upgrading in-situ, yielding an attractive light sweet crude oil. The process is “tunable”, facilitating production of various product slates.

The use of RF technology in shale processing would enable the fuel to be extracted from the earth in only one to two months. In-ground heating methods that do not employ radio waves, by contrast, require three to four years to replicate the natural conversion process.

Green Car Congress

While efforts to produce sustainable biofuels are gearing up, the ability to economically and cleanly produce petroleum from regional deposits (oil shales and tar sands) should make the necessary transition to renewable energy easier.

Peak oil doom is looking more and more like an adolescent fantasy.