LENR vs Solar/Wind, and emerging Green Technologies.

Quote from Paradigmnoia

Aluminum, being the third most common element on Earth, is already quite everywhere.

Especially in the autopsied brains of people with Alzheimer's and autism.

It's very interesting that aluminum, despite its ubiquitousness in the form of aluminum salts, is not part of any biochemical pathway.

Quote from Max Nozin

I love the idea of having some energy-dense medium to organize a cycle [energy rich area]-> transportation-> [consumer] -> [recycled material] -> [energy rich area] Why?

Compared to gasoline Aluminum is heavy... What many people do look for is a closed process to store fuel cell Hydrogen. Currently methanol is the best solution but at the end is CO2. So you have to form it with CO2.

Alu + water could work too if you provide it to a Hydrogen station but the pressure needs to be around 170Bar, what can be easily done with direct compression electrolysis, but needs a pump in the ALU case.

But new material are on the horizon that like Pd are able to store a lot of Hydrogen at low pressure.

Thus Methanol is the from runner. Google headquarter tests it since years.

Quote from Max Nozin

maybe gallium is there to skip steps to deal with oxide layer? Not sure how much is needed, maybe traces.
Mark U water can be used in closed loop

I love the idea of having some energy-dense medium to organize a cycle [energy rich area]-> transportation-> [consumer] -> [recycled material] -> [energy rich area] Why?

- it can give a boos remote places rich in solar and hydro energy but not developed currently due to cost of transmission lines and energy storage capacity

- the aluminum here solves the storage problem, pretty much as oil reservoirs do

- the energy cycle should be loved by industrial and transportation giants

- subject to calculations, this method of storing/transporting energy from places where it is abundant can be orders of magnitude cheaper than building battery storage and transmission lines, or transporting batteries to the source and back. Australia comes to mind which could benefit the most.

Currently it looks like that hydrogen is loosing popularity among car manufacturers due to advances in batteries but slowly gaining traction in trucking.

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I to quite like the idea of dense recyclable energy storage mediums, that release stored energy far from their production point! Metal may make a superior energy storage medium in terms of regular chemistry. An interesting concept.

https://www.popularmechanics.c…temperature-nuclear-code/

So about Inconel and similar alloys this high energy alloy could be useful in fission MSRs and hydrogen/metal experiments. Dr. Dofours has papers about Iron or Nickel metal systems. All included metals are of the D segment of the periodic table including chromium and molybdenum! With it's thermal features wondering if it makes a good metal fuel powder/reacting anode material for reactors?

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I just watched this whole movie, and I'm too devastated to say anything.

After then you could enjoy this 1, 2, 3, 4

Quote from rubycarat

I just watched this whole movie, and I'm too devastated to say anything. It's a negative portrait alright, one that matches what is at stake. The sad part is, we're out of time, the damage is already piled up exponentially. I can only hope cold fusion comes through soon.

I have also watched the movie, but most of it is incorrect.

I do agree on biofuel and biomass, which I consider is not an environmental sustainable solution. So I'm optimistic of a future of solar and wind, if not LENR arrives on the stage.

1. Energy payback time for wind and solar is now months, i.e. Wind and solar is VERY environmental friendly. After a few months they are CO2 negative rest of lifetime.

We know wind turbines kills birds, but this is less of a problem in offshore turbines. Cats is a bigger threat against birds.

2. There will always be crooks in the world that wants to exploit the globe for money and dont care about nature, also within renewable businesses. But that does not mean the technology is bad.

3. Denmark is now developing a 20 MW offshore wind turbine which do not use rare earths in the generator. So the technology is getting even more environmental friendly.

4. Solar power technology is improving, so 20 year old panels cannot be compared to todays technology.

5. Everyone can agree that cutting down forest to install solar panels is stupid. Solar panels should be installed also in deserts in an environmental friendly way, i.e. plants and solar plants can live side by side.

6. Installing solar panels on building roofs and office facades should be a win win both for owners and the globe as solar is getting REALLY cheap.

7. Electric cars are 80-90% efficient, while a gasoline car only use 20 to 25% of the gasoline for propulsion, rest is heat losses. Even with a grid based on natural gas or coal it is better with electric cars, especially for local smog and NOX pollution.

8. Traditional nuclear power is way too expensive, ref UK Hinkley Point project, and the absolutely INSANE electricity price to be offered.

9. The newest ideas for solar now is Bifacial solar panels lifted up of the ground, so it can be installed on farms so you can both do farming and have solar plants side by side. Panels should also be able to lifted above ground in deserts, so you avoid removing plants beneath.

To conclude: The movie mostly shows how crooks can take advantage of renewable business, but this is not the renewable future that is being built now.

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Energy payback time for wind and solar is now months

Only with massive subsidizes. The belief of yours doesn't explain, why for example wind plants in Germany won't generate enough of money for their scrapping even after decades of run..

Richard Feynman(?): "Shut up and calculate!"

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Denmark is now developing a 20 MW offshore wind turbine which do not use rare earths in the generator. So the technology is getting even more environmental friendly.

This is also nice example. Denmark sports with largest portion of renewable electricity in its portfolio "thanks" to its offshore wind plants. Not quite occidentally it also has most expensive electricity from whole EU. How is that possible, if it generates electricity "for free"?

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Electric cars are 80-90% efficient, while a gasoline car only use 20 to 25% of the gasoline for propulsion, rest is heat losses

But efficiency of electricity production in plants is only 40 - 45%. Charging cycle consumes another 16 - 20% and Tesla batteries drain spontaneously by speed 5 miles per day. In this moment the energy efficiency of electric cars doesn't look so bright. And we still don't talk about energy required for manufacturing and recycling batteries.

As a general rule, if some "environmentally clean" solution should supersede fossil fuel solution, it also must get cheaper in terms of TCO, i.e. Total Cost of Ownership. I mean cheaper without any subsidizes, mandates and incentives. Do you know, that for example Tesla has made profit $105 million by selling cars - but even more, i.e. $133 million by selling regulatory credits? Even with it, its cars are getting way more expensive for their users, than gasoline cars of the same class. This is cost of hidden energy, required for raw sources, required for production of electric cars and their batteries. Just because this energy is exerted somewhere else (for example in China), it's cost won't disappear: it adds to total price of Tesla car ownership.

Quote from Zephir_AWT

Only with massive subsidizes. The belief of yours doesn't explain, why for example wind plants in Germany won't generate enough of money for their scrapping even after decades of run..

Quote from Zephir_AWT

But efficiency of electricity production in plants is only 40 - 45%.

I ask you to dig a bit deeper and trying to understand the problems. Old turbines are small and inefficient and the manufactures do no longer provide spare parts (this is a political issue). The higher a turbine is the more efficient it is. The total cost of investment for 1kwh electricity is now in the region of 6 cents. For Wales (UK) even lower. The article you reference are typical for an industry that likes to make money for free. (State money) And last: Germanys political system is a closed mafia community that is again at the same level of power as it was before WWII. (actually 1933). These folks allow to charge anything the like for "green current".

Efficiency of electricity production in plants is only 40 - 45%. May be you did sleep for at least 40 years. The latest thermic turbo generator of Mitsubishi is rated at 60%. Further electric car are more that 9 times as efficient as carbon cars if you drive only short distances. 3 x is for long distances. Further nobody does add the fuel of the lorry that refills the gasoline station the ships dirty fuel to bring it to your place etc.... Germany could use excess energy of wind turbines for producing Hydrogen or fuel cell carbon fuels.

Quote from rubycarat

Hi oystia, you make a lot of points that I cannot respond to at this time. However, the gist is this: For twenty-thirty years of service, we are dump;ing huge amounts of energy and destroying pristine environments. Looking at what is left after the "renewable" plant goes dead is a dead landscape. How do you measure that loss?

Also, the fact remains that the energy density just isn't there to power what we have now. We have systems that depend on an energy density given by hydrocarbons. Solar, wind, or biomass do not provide that energy density, period. So right there, it is shown to be band-aid for a short duration. (And as the movie shows, it can't even power a band!!)

I understand the shocking truth that this movie shows, but we have to be honest about the reality. Energy density is the key to swapping out away from fossil fuels. And it's just not there with "renewables", and as for the environmental damage, I am soooo glad that our small community nixed the TerraGen wind farm to be built on the mountain ridge sacred to local tribes of Native Americans. It would have been a travesty to have power for thirty years, and a dead zone forever.

We both agree - LENR is our solution. We've got to make people realize this and make it happen .

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Agreed this isn't the time to cut energy density but to push it! Anything relatively safer for the environment and denser than hydrocarbons is the plug. We want to replace and phase out fossil fuels without energetically crippling society, appreciating of the higher potencial.

Quote from interested observer

“I understand the shocking truth that this movie shows, but we have to be honest about the reality. Energy density is the key to swapping out away from fossil fuels. And it's just not there with "renewables”

Fortunately, relatively few people who actually know anything share this distorted and false viewpoint. If the fossil fuel oligarchy got the hell out of the way, these fringe ideas would deservingly vanish into the dustbin of history.

🤔 fringe? If it is explainable within the basic laws of physics it isn't fringe, simply alternative and new. I love renewables specifically solar, geothermal and hydro power, but fuel based systems that burn or react something at the will of the energy user are superior, period. That's why the sun and the earth's core have been running so long and why active animals/humans digest and excrete chemical energy that can be stored and converted for a rainy day. Mastering fire and fossil fuels did us well! I hope we don't devolve or stagnate, energy density is the key to swapping out away from fossil fuels.

A combined cycle natural gas fueled power plant actual operates with efficiencies of conversion of chemical energy to electricity with a percentage in the 90s. In order to run a combined cycle plant two very large gas turbines are required. The gas turbines can operate at 60% efficiency. The exhaust heat from both gas turbine is then sent into a heat recovery steam generator HRSG and steam supplies both high pressure and low pressure sides of a steam turbine. The electric power come from three generators; one for each turbine. The size of the operation must be very larger to use the HRSG and thereby get the efficiency. That how it worked when I helped build these units in the late 90s. They still produce CO2.

With colder fusion, thermodynamics suggest available energy in the order of millions of BTU with an input in the order of thousands of BTU from relative cheap deuterium/oxygen and also from hydrogen/oxygen in a more dense reaction. The thermodynamics are base on thermonuclear fusion. But, thermonuclear fusion uses very structured atoms (see SAM) rather than the electrical segmented atoms which cause colder fusion. That difference is likely the reason that colder fusion produces very little photonic energy. Once we understand what endothermic products are produced by colder fusion, then we should be able improve conversion of those endothermic products to photonic energy. The hope rest firmly on established principles of chemical engineering. The work to get to promise needs as much help as possible.

Quote from Zephir_AWT

Only with massive subsidizes. The belief of yours doesn't explain, why for example wind plants in Germany won't generate enough of money for their scrapping even after decades of run..

Richard Feynman(?): "Shut up and calculate!"

Zephir, I will be happy to answer all your questions. And there are a lot of myths roaming around on the internet unfortunately….

1. First of all, when I said "energy pay back time" it has nothing to do with cost or subsidies.

This is the amount of time a wind turbine or a solar panel has to produce energy to pay back all the energy that went into making the turbine or solar power, from mining the minerals to constructing the plant.

And today we talk months rather than years for renewables.

2. Regarding dismantling old power plants, this is the same issue as with any power plants, coal fired or nuclear.

Politics has to be in place to demand the owners to set aside a yearly amount of money to secure that dismantling is covered at the end of life time.

I think we have seen numerous of examples where old decommissioned nuclear plants have had to be covered by tax payers because the owners did not have that requirement in place from day one.

Outside Norway where I live we have a number of old oil producing platforms. Should any of the oil companies go bancrupt these days of low oil price, it will probably be up to the state and tax payers to remove the platforms at the end, if no other private companies where to buy them…

3. On the issue of subsidies, you should note the present popular method of issuing contracts to renewables. This is done the last 5 years as PPA = Power Purchase Agreement, and when a governnment buys, the PPA is often oficial numbers.

The latest Offshore Wind power Projects outside UK is going at an long term PPA at close to market price of electrical power (Around 40 UK Pounds/MWhr).

The ongoing UK Nuclear Power project Hinkley Point has a long term PPA of now above 100 UK Pounds/MWhr and inflation adjusted for 30 years.

The reason for the fast decline in Wind power costs has been the growth of the turbines. The largest one now under testing in Netherlands 12 MW size offshore turbine, while for 20 years ago the largest was some 2 MW size…

And in a few years we will get 20 MW turbines that bring the cost down further.

So you see, subsidies for solar and wind is mostly something of the past, the cost have now come down to subsidy free power….

Quote from rubycarat

We have systems that depend on an energy density given by hydrocarbons.

Battery technology is improving.. the tesla battery in the Tesla3 can burn off any average petrol car

from the green light..

and the Eviation can carry 9 passengers 1000 km.

I have always wondered why we did not resort more to geothermal energy, you dig deep enough and you find constant heat. No need for any fancy contraptions, exotic semi conductors or rare earth metals. You get +25°C per kilometer of depth. Can be done about anywhere on the planet except in mountainous areas.

The soviets dug a 12,262 meters deep hole back in the day, temperature at the bottom is 180°C. What kind of advantages nuclear fission plants can have over that..since they use the fission heat to run steam turbines anyway ?

By the by, what is causing the earth's core to be melted..fusion maybe ??? See Fusion at the center of the earth from Nature ( 2016).

Kind of remind me of that metallic hydrogen they made using... a high pressure anvil.....

Quote from rubycarat

Hi oystia, you make a lot of points that I cannot respond to at this time. However, the gist is this: For twenty-thirty years of service, we are dump;ing huge amounts of energy and destroying pristine environments. Looking at what is left after the "renewable" plant goes dead is a dead landscape. How do you measure that loss?

Also, the fact remains that the energy density just isn't there to power what we have now. We have systems that depend on an energy density given by hydrocarbons. Solar, wind, or biomass do not provide that energy density, period. So right there, it is shown to be band-aid for a short duration. (And as the movie shows, it can't even power a band!!)

I understand the shocking truth that this movie shows, but we have to be honest about the reality. Energy density is the key to swapping out away from fossil fuels. And it's just not there with "renewables", and as for the environmental damage, I am soooo glad that our small community nixed the TerraGen wind farm to be built on the mountain ridge sacred to local tribes of Native Americans. It would have been a travesty to have power for thirty years, and a dead zone forever.

We both agree - LENR is our solution. We've got to make people realize this and make it happen.

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Hi Ruby,

On the issue of energy density, it really depends on the definition.

Yes - a traditional Nuclear Reactor has a very high energy density.

BUT if we start doing calculations on actual net land area requirements we get the following numbers:

In the US the official number from Nuclear industry is an average of 1,3 Square miles pr. 1000 MW power for the US plants. If we use SI units we get 3328 M2 pr. MW for a nuclear plant.

I assume this is the total fenced of area for the nuclear plants, where no man or animals can roam around.

Now then: A modern 4,2 MW land based wind turbine may have a base of 7m in diameter, which means we get ONLY some 9 M2 pr. MW for a wind turbine. And there is no further fencing of the turbine. On a farmland the animals may go straight up to the turbine base.

Yes, I know; The wind does not always blow. BUT in a large interconnected grid, the wind ALWAYS blows somewhere, which solve that problem of intermittency. AND with a capacity factor of 30%, we still get 18 m2/MW - far far better energy density than Nuclear.

So, the Nuclear industry loves to talk about energy density, but Wind turbines is far far more energy dens, when compared to the fenced off land area requirement,

Actually also solar power plants is not extremely less power dense than a Nuclear Plant: Rule of thumb 9300 M2 pr. MW solar power. And for the new Bifacial panels we can reduce the number to 7400 M2 pr. MW. And the efficiency will improve further.

But again, as I said before the latest technology is solar power combined with farmland, either as raised up in the air, or panels place Vertical as fences with farmland in between.

So in principle Solar power can be the most power dense energy source if designed accordingly.

This is WHY I am optimistic that Solar Power especially and Wind power AND energy storage will absolutely win the future (IF not LENR happens that is )