Whatever happened to 'Drill Here, Drill Now' ?

[DarrinS]

But you may get pulled over by cops that think you're carrying around a meth lab in your trunk.

[CosmicCowboy]

EDIT> I'm sure everyone has a CNC plasma cutter laying around.

Actually, I do...

[RandomGuy]

Coy in the interrogative. I think we do, regardless of whether it's a good idea. We're the Saudi Arabia of coal, aren't we?

We are indeed.

Read up on the damage caused by coal mining, and I'm not talking about just the century old fires either.

The worst of it:
http://www.thestar.com/sciencetech/E...article/306165

Even the underground conventional mining will put nasty things into water tables.

Given the fights over water going on today, I can't imagine why we would want to sacrifice sources of clean water for coal.

The ironic thing is that taking contaminated water and making it clean enough to drink or large scale desalinization both require: energy.

So if you up your water sources from coal mining for coal energy, you end up needing more: energy.

The whole thing doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

It has to be galling to a lot of those on the right that the future of our energy supply will be "green". The narrative on the right is that all environmentalism is silly, alarmist, and costs jobs. I will suck for them to have to admit that maybe, just maybe, those crazy environmentalists might have been right about something.

[RandomGuy]

OK, your background is liberal arts. Mine is Science and Engineering. I actually make a living doing stuff in the energy field. I've actually got a pretty darn good handle on whats doable and what isn't.

And I am always willing to learn more than I do now. I may be a liberal arts guy, but I am very scientifically literate, because being so helps evaluate energy policy.

I don't have to tell you, as I am sure you already know, how handy knowledge of physics and chemistry is when it comes to thinking about this topic. I can tell you why shale and tar sands are pipe dreams, simply because they just aren't chemically/energetically efficient.

What do you think we should do for energy independence?

[CosmicCowboy]

We are indeed.

Read up on the damage caused by coal mining, and I'm not talking about just the century old fires either.

The worst of it:
http://www.thestar.com/sciencetech/E...article/306165

Even the underground conventional mining will put nasty things into water tables.

Given the fights over water going on today, I can't imagine why we would want to sacrifice sources of clean water for coal.

The ironic thing is that taking contaminated water and making it clean enough to drink or large scale desalinization both require: energy.

So if you up your water sources from coal mining for coal energy, you end up needing more: energy.

The whole thing doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

It has to be galling to a lot of those on the right that the future of our energy supply will be "green". The narrative on the right is that all environmentalism is silly, alarmist, and costs jobs. I will suck for them to have to admit that maybe, just maybe, those crazy environmentalists might have been right about something.

Actually, it's not galling to me at all (if I am one of those hated "rights" that you speak of ) but it IS the end of life as we know it. True "Green" living is more of a local solution than something you can just put on a power grid and keep on with life as usual.

I will actually be set up for my green future with orchards, gardens, an energy efficient home, acreage (and the knowledge) to farm and ranch and raise animals and crops, etc. I will have ponds for raising fish and freshwater shrimp and barring a complete meltdown of the social structure, power grid and collapse into total anarchy I will be set.

It's you urban weenies that don't know how to do a ing thing except talk and play video games that are gonna be screwed.

[clambake]

Actually, it's not galling to me at all (if I am one of those hated "rights" that you speak of ) but it IS the end of life as we know it. True "Green" living is more of a local solution than something you can just put on a power grid and keep on with life as usual.

I will actually be set up for my green future with orchards, gardens, an energy efficient home, acreage (and the knowledge) to farm and ranch and raise animals and crops, etc. I will have ponds for raising fish and freshwater shrimp and barring a complete meltdown of the social structure, power grid and collapse into total anarchy I will be set.

It's you urban weenies that don't know how to do a ing thing except talk and play video games that are gonna be screwed.

[RandomGuy]

Actually, it's not galling to me at all (if I am one of those hated "rights" that you speak of ) but it IS the end of life as we know it. True "Green" living is more of a local solution than something you can just put on a power grid and keep on with life as usual.

I will actually be set up for my green future with orchards, gardens, an energy efficient home, acreage (and the knowledge) to farm and ranch and raise animals and crops, etc. I will have ponds for raising fish and freshwater shrimp and barring a complete meltdown of the social structure, power grid and collapse into total anarchy I will be set.

It's you urban weenies that don't know how to do a ing thing except talk and play video games that are gonna be screwed.

Oddly enough that is exactly what I plan on doing for my retirement.

I have read a LOT on green/efficient house building, gardening and so forth as well. I have years before I will have the money to get started tho', so I have time to learn the farming/ranching bits.

[LnGrrrR]

Oddly enough that is exactly what I plan on doing for my retirement.

I have read a LOT on green/efficient house building, gardening and so forth as well. I have years before I will have the money to get started tho', so I have time to learn the farming/ranching bits.

F that. I'll just make sure to gather enough friends to be in the ruling party of whatever gang takes over the anarchic city.

[RandomGuy]

One of the good things about having some accounting/finance knowledge is that it helps one pick through the costs/benefits of a lot of the green building stuff.

Here is one that I really like:
Rainwater harvesting.
(sample google search here)

As energy and fresh ground water both get more expensive, you can expect to see this take off.

There is even a handy guide to it put out by the Great State of Texas.
(click here for the pdf file)

Not cost-effective overall compared to municipal water at the moment, but I will estimate that will change at some point in the medium term.

[RandomGuy]

F that. I'll just make sure to gather enough friends to be in the ruling party of whatever gang takes over the anarchic city.

I take it your social club will look somethign like this?

[CosmicCowboy]

And I am always willing to learn more than I do now. I may be a liberal arts guy, but I am very scientifically literate, because being so helps evaluate energy policy.

I don't have to tell you, as I am sure you already know, how handy knowledge of physics and chemistry is when it comes to thinking about this topic. I can tell you why shale and tar sands are pipe dreams, simply because they just aren't chemically/energetically efficient.

What do you think we should do for energy independence?

OK, I am going to assume this is a straight question and answer it accordingly.

Conventional renewable energy (wind/solar) works best at a local level. By that, I mean a home or cluster of homes that has it's own wind/solar source and own storage. It especially works well if the homes are designed for maximum efficiency.

The problem with conventional wind/solar as a power grid energy solution is the unreliability and subsequent huge storage requirements.

I really think that for a conventional power grid that nuclear is the way to go. Part of the problem with the expense of nuclear power plants is they reinvented the wheel every time they built one. It took years of wading through tons of paperwork to get one approved and then every single component was custom built. If we came up with one "standard" plant plan, got it approved, and mass produced it we could cut years and illions of dollars out of the cost.

Obviously nuclear can't be 100% of the solution because by nature it is unsuited to handle the variations of "peak" load conditions but it could certainly handle 80% of the total load. 98% efficient natural gas turbines could handle the rest, at least in our part of the country...

As far as transportation, we have come a long way with battery technology and electric cars (that can be recharged from the power grid) are getting more feasible all the time.

Bio-diesel is a good renewable alternative for transportable fuel as well is butanol. Butanol makes a LOT more sense than ethanol from a technical standpoint , but the big agri businesses bribed congress to make ethanol the big winner..

[CosmicCowboy]

One of the good things about having some accounting/finance knowledge is that it helps one pick through the costs/benefits of a lot of the green building stuff.

Here is one that I really like:
Rainwater harvesting.
(sample google search here)

As energy and fresh ground water both get more expensive, you can expect to see this take off.

There is even a handy guide to it put out by the Great State of Texas.
(click here for the pdf file)

Not cost-effective overall compared to municipal water at the moment, but I will estimate that will change at some point in the medium term.

I have a 20,000 gallon rainwater collection system already installed as a fallback system if necessary. I have a conventional well for irrigation and house water as well but it's always nice to have an armageddon backup.

[RandomGuy]

OK, I am going to assume this is a straight question and answer it accordingly.

Conventional renewable energy (wind/solar) works best at a local level. By that, I mean a home or cluster of homes that has it's own wind/solar source and own storage. It especially works well if the homes are designed for maximum efficiency.

The problem with conventional wind/solar as a power grid energy solution is the unreliability and subsequent huge storage requirements.

I really think that for a conventional power grid that nuclear is the way to go. Part of the problem with the expense of nuclear power plants is they reinvented the wheel every time they built one. It took years of wading through tons of paperwork to get one approved and then every single component was custom built. If we came up with one "standard" plant plan, got it approved, and mass produced it we could cut years and illions of dollars out of the cost.

Obviously nuclear can't be 100% of the solution because by nature it is unsuited to handle the variations of "peak" load conditions but it could certainly handle 80% of the total load. 98% efficient natural gas turbines could handle the rest, at least in our part of the country...

As far as transportation, we have come a long way with battery technology and electric cars (that can be recharged from the power grid) are getting more feasible all the time.

Bio-diesel is a good renewable alternative for transportable fuel as well is butanol. Butanol makes a LOT more sense than ethanol from a technical standpoint , but the big agri businesses bribed congress to make ethanol the big winner..

It was a straight question.

I have come to virtually the exact same conclusions, and have stated them here on numerous occasions.

You are exactly right that a lot of the problem for nuclear in the US has been a lack of standardization. There are a few new generation designs that show a lot of promise. The biggest part of the cost-overruns are delays caused by litigation though. THAT cannot be easily overcome, nor can the security of waste/fuel shipments really be addressed to my satisfaction.

Nuclear WILL form part of the ultimate solution, but we should not think it will be a panacea.

I think that a more distributed power generation system would work, along with a few large scale renewable projects.

Some solid research into fuel cells will produce some solutions to bring storage costs down. I think retro-fitting all large buildings or clusters of buildings (think shopping malls, skyscrapers, large industrial buildings, etc) with some solar/wind and the storage needed would work wonders.

The primary advantage to this is that it makes the grid VERY robust, cuts down on transmission loss, and provides a good number of non-outsource-able jobs.

[RandomGuy]

The more I read on distributed power generation, the more I think that some version of this is the way to go.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distributed_generation

http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/002152.html

Integrating Distributed EnergybResources into Emerging Electricity Markets: Scoping Study (pdf 74 pages)

I think if we can throw a few trillion at the banks, we can *probably* come up with some spare change for storage research to really make this doable and economical.

[RandomGuy]

Interesting fact I heard recently:

One US Heavy Division uses more fuel than the entire US Army did at its peak in WW2.

Think about the implications of THAT.

The US military has begun to realize it's vulnerability in that regard, and has started researching on how to make its units more self sufficient. Cut's down on vulnerable fuel convoys.

There is a HUGE potential for synergy here on a lot of levels in economic terms. , we might even get back to actually MAKING things, rather than buying them from the Chinese.

[johnsmith]

53 out of 116 posts in this thread have been RG.

I know people that like to hear themselves speak, but I've never known anyone that likes to see themselves post.

[RandomGuy]

I have a 20,000 gallon rainwater collection system already installed as a fallback system if necessary. I have a conventional well for irrigation and house water as well but it's always nice to have an armageddon backup.

Very cool. If you can get over being irritated at me at some point, I would love to see how much it cost.

I did a paper for my cost accounting class once on the economics of installing solar power in the Austin area for small businesses and data on the costs of these projects is always something I try to get a handle on.

[RandomGuy]

53 out of 116 posts in this thread have been RG.

I know people that like to hear themselves speak, but I've never known anyone that likes to see themselves post.

Did I mention that I like the topic of energy?

[CosmicCowboy]

The collection system itself could probably be put in for about 10-15K if you hired all the work done. The rain water source is PVC gutters on a 2000sf metal building (obviously not included in the 10-15K cost) I do a lot of stuff myself or act as my own contractor hiring manual labor so it didn't cost me as much. I'm also in the process of putting in the shrimp farm and another "fish" tank this year and have already started planting the orchard this year...going to have pecans, peaches, pears, apples, figs, pomegranates, cherries, almonds, blueberries, blackberrys, and grapes. Also about 100 olive trees.

You need to get rich and famous so you can buy it from my kids when I die.

[SnakeBoy]

I have a 20,000 gallon rainwater collection system already installed as a fallback system if necessary. I have a conventional well for irrigation and house water as well but it's always nice to have an armageddon backup.

Why did you go with a rainwater system instead of converting your well to solar?

[CosmicCowboy]

Why did you go with a rainwater system instead of converting your well to solar?

My wells too big to go solar. I use it for irrigation too.

[RandomGuy]

The collection system itself could probably be put in for about 10-15K if you hired all the work done. The rain water source is PVC gutters on a 2000sf metal building (obviously not included in the 10-15K cost) I do a lot of stuff myself or act as my own contractor hiring manual labor so it didn't cost me as much. I'm also in the process of putting in the shrimp farm and another "fish" tank this year and have already started planting the orchard this year...going to have pecans, peaches, pears, apples, figs, pomegranates, cherries, almonds, blueberries, blackberrys, and grapes. Also about 100 olive trees.

You need to get rich and famous so you can buy it from my kids when I die.

Sounds about right. From what I could see from the Texas Rainwater Guide, the overall costs for larger systems, labor included, is around 50 to 75 cents per gallon. (there is actually a table at the back of the guide at pg51 that shows various storage tank costs)

That guide also has some good guides as to how much water one ends up using, btw.

How much does water cost in your area from the local utility?

[SnakeBoy]

My wells too big to go solar. I use it for irrigation too.

That makes sense. I'm planning on converting my well to solar so that's why I was asking.

[CosmicCowboy]

Sounds about right. From what I could see from the Texas Rainwater Guide, the overall costs for larger systems, labor included, is around 50 to 75 cents per gallon. (there is actually a table at the back of the guide at pg51 that shows various storage tank costs)

That guide also has some good guides as to how much water one ends up using, btw.

How much does water cost in your area from the local utility?

I live in SA and water costs way too damn much, but the system I am showing you is at the ranchito (80 acres south of town) I don't actually "pay" for water...have a 2hp submersible at about 300ft...I don't have a clue what it costs per gallon, but not much.

[RandomGuy]

I live in SA and water costs way too damn much, but the system I am showing you is at the ranchito (80 acres south of town) I don't actually "pay" for water...have a 2hp submersible at about 300ft...I don't have a clue what it costs per gallon, but not much.

Ah.

Is the 2000sq ft collection surface area enough to keep the tanks full by itself?

Some of the sample calculations in the handbook show inflows/outflows on a 2500 sq ft area under a rough approximation of one household usage can only support a 10,000 gallon tank under the best conditions in central texas.

I take it that you don't draw it down much if you don't actively live there.

Do you take any data on how much you use in any given month?