Feb
29
Two New Geothermal Projects Get Underway
February 29, 2008 | Leave a Comment
The U.S. Department of Energy announced a partnership to test Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) technology near Reno Nevada. The idea is to use the new technology concepts of EGS in a permeable underground strata with water injection into “hot dry rock.” The test is going on at the Ormat Technology Desert Peak site, [...]
Feb
28
The Choices In Atomic Fission
February 28, 2008 | 4 Comments
With the post on Monday February 25th 2008 logging so much traffic both regular visitors and new folks I will list and lightly discuss some of the potentates in the fission reactor field. Links where available are included, offering a succinct guide to quick information.
Reactors are considered by their “Generation” starting with the Gen [...]
Feb
27
The Best I Could Find To Counter the Assault on Biofuels
February 27, 2008 | Leave a Comment
Some folks write lots better than my compositions. (Hat tip to Dean Crockett at Boeing for catching my miss spelling of Dr. Robert Bussard.) I was a little surprised and taken aback by the criticisms of ethanol and other biomass sources of carbon based fuels and feedstocks. I am simply not going to [...]
Feb
26
Making Your Own Personal Power Plant – And Maybe Save Some Gasoline Someday
February 26, 2008 | Leave a Comment
All you need is a location with a high temperature and a lower temperature. Take two copper wires and a length of steel wire. Twist one end of each copper wire at each end of the steel wire. Immerse one end of the now coiled wire in a heated location and the [...]
Feb
25
Finding The Facts In the Midst of Emotions About Atomic Power
February 25, 2008 | 3 Comments
Old enough to remember the horrors and extensive coverage of the U.S. Three Mile Island crises and the Chernobyl Disaster, many others and I have lodged a stop order in our thinking when atomic fission is mentioned as a way to power up the electrical grid. Add to those the incessant and furtive efforts [...]
Feb
22
Brrr, I Want to Be Warm When Saving Money!
February 22, 2008 | Leave a Comment
It was minus 9 Fahrenheit with a minus 37 wind chill Wednesday morning. I also paid the electric bill for January today and these two things have focused my attention on just what will I do about the costs to stay warm. Yesterday we looked into how the clothes dryer could be lots [...]
Feb
21
A “Gotta Have It!” Item Is Coming to Market
February 21, 2008 | 2 Comments
The biggest energy hog in the home is the clothes dryer. In the U.S. they are so appallingly poor in efficiency that the U.S. Department of Energy has no models awarded an “Energy Star.” While the refrigerator might be your biggest user, its likely quite efficient as they are essentially heat pumps or [...]
Feb
20
Properly Beating Up the Oil Companies
February 20, 2008 | Leave a Comment
It’s really easy to beat on the oil companies. Every time one fills up a gasoline diesel or propane tank, the agony is real. The blame has to go somewhere, and blame aplenty and usually justified was more or less valid. The oil companies were, that is were in the past, actually [...]
Feb
19
Why the Pure Hydrogen Economy Is Dying
February 19, 2008 | 6 Comments
Man has been moving to carbon enriched with hydrogen for a couple of centuries now. One could say we’re decarbonizing, because since the dawn of the fire until the discovery of coal we burned primarily wood. Wood has a carbon to hydrogen (C:H) ratio of 10 to 1 or wood has 10 carbon [...]
Feb
18
Fact Checking the Air to Fuel Concept From Los Alamos
February 18, 2008 | 2 Comments
Los Alamos National Laboratory sent out its press release last week and has a link to a pdf that describes their new concept called “Green Freedom” for catching CO2 out of the air and sending the CO2 on to existing processes that can make fuels such as gasoline and diesel. The concept it seems [...]
