Urine powered car will get 90 mpg

TellyKNeasuss said:
I bet this has the oil companies really pissed off.
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Why would it? It's not like you'd just be able to pee in the gas tank and drive off. You'd need a totally whole new infrastructure to deliver urea-based hydrogen-fuel to millions of cars worldwide, assuming that enough urea can be collected to fuel more than a tiny percentage of vehicles, and assuming that enough people are willing to choose electric fuel-cell cars over fossil-fuel cars.

The oil companies have nothing to worry about yet.
 
Can i ask something stupid?

What is the reason we (USA) arnt investing more in water powered cars/engines?
 
OneShotKi11 said:
Can i ask something stupid?

What is the reason we (USA) arnt investing more in water powered cars/engines?
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Because you can't power a car with water. You can power it with hydrogen, which can be extracted from water, but the energy required for the extraction is more than the energy you get from burning the hydrogen.
 
OneShotKi11 said:
Can i ask something stupid?

What is the reason we (USA) arnt investing more in water powered cars/engines?
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They've already reached the boondoggle quota for the fiscal year. And besides, there's a water shortage.
 
A gallon of pee?! I would have to drink quite a bit of liquid to fill up a gallon.
 
thaiboxerken said:
A gallon of pee?! I would have to drink quite a bit of liquid to fill up a gallon.
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Even worse they're actually talking about a gallon of urea, and there's only around 2.5% urea in urine, so you'd actually need to process 40 gallons of urine to get 1 gallon of urea. :eek:

That's a lot of pee.
 
marting said:
Less than .1% of urine is actually urea. It wouldn't serve the purpose of the article to say that I suppose.
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Oops. Urea is a couple percent by weight. My bad. What's worse, more beer increases the flow but reduces the concentration. I guess beer isn't the answer. At least to that.
 
Heard an item on NPR today, about the Santa Cruz river which runs into the US from Mexico around Nogales. In Mexico is is largely denuded by cattle and wood gathering, and especially as it nears the border. There is one two mile section that is being restored by a private conservation project. Right at the border it disappears; it has been sucked dry by Nogales, Mexico. The dry bed passes through Nogales, AZ and suddenly blooms again, thanks to the Nogales water conservation district, which processes sewage from both of the cities and puts it back into the river bed.

Bit there's trouble. The Mexican city is protesting that they don't get paid anything for their pee. They want a price, or they'll refuse to send any more over (cue the joke machine here).

Maybe we now know what happens in that treatment plant?
 
Reading through the Wikipedia page on Urea, I was surprised by how many uses it has. In some cars, for example, Urea is injected into the exhaust system to reduce Nitrous Oxide emissions. (BlueTec System.)

And because of the huge demand for it, there are methods of producing it synthetically: "Urea is produced on a scale of some 100,000,000 tons per year worldwide".

If there's already a demand for 100,000,000 tons of Urea per year, why isn't it already being extracted from urine? The only reason I can think of is that it is more economical (and convenient) to produce it synthetically.

I don't think we'll be seeing cars powered by actual urine anytime soon.

Here's the Wikipedia list of some of the current commercial uses for Urea:
* A stabilizer in nitrocellulose explosives.
* A component of animal feed, providing a relatively cheap source of nitrogen to promote growth.
* A non-corroding alternative to rock salt for road de-icing, and the resurfacing of snowboarding halfpipes and terrain parks.
* A flavor-enhancing additive for cigarettes.
* A main ingredient in hair removers such as Nair or Veet.
* A browning agent in factory-produced pretzels.
* An ingredient in some hair conditioners, facial cleansers, bath oils, skin softeners, and lotions.
* A reactant in some ready-to-use cold compresses for first-aid use, due to the endothermic reaction it creates when mixed with water.
* A cloud seeding agent, along with other salts.
* A flame-proofing agent, commonly used in dry chemical fire extinguisher charges such as the urea-potassium bicarbonate mixture.
* An ingredient in many tooth whitening products.
* An ingredient in dish soap.
* Along with ammonium phosphate, as a yeast nutrient, for fermentation of sugars into ethanol.
* A nutrient used by plankton in ocean nourishment experiments for geoengineering purposes.
* As an additive to extend the working temperature and open time of hide glue.
* As a solubility-enhancing and moisture-retaining additive to dye baths for textile dyeing or printing.
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I don't know about you, but I find some of these uses disturbing.
 
I can just see it,the husband coming home three sheets to the wind,"I had to drink 10 pints love,the car needed topping up."
 
Brian-M said:
Reading through the Wikipedia page on Urea, I was surprised by how many uses it has. In some cars, for example, Urea is injected into the exhaust system to reduce Nitrous Oxide emissions. (BlueTec System.)
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I've noticed that here in the UK for the last year or so: to meet the Euro 5 emissions standards, new diesel cars and trucks are fitted with a system which injects urea solution into the exhaust. I understand the amount used in cars is small enough that they only need a refill at about 10,000 miles, so the tank can be topped up whenever the car's serviced. On big trucks it's easy to spot the bright blue cap on the extra tank beside the fuel tank. There's also the curious new experience of an occasional faint whiff of ammonia from a car in front.
 
shadron said:
Heard an item on NPR today, about the Santa Cruz river which runs into the US from Mexico around Nogales. In Mexico is is largely denuded by cattle and wood gathering, and especially as it nears the border. There is one two mile section that is being restored by a private conservation project. Right at the border it disappears; it has been sucked dry by Nogales, Mexico. The dry bed passes through Nogales, AZ and suddenly blooms again, thanks to the Nogales water conservation district, which processes sewage from both of the cities and puts it back into the river bed.

Bit there's trouble. The Mexican city is protesting that they don't get paid anything for their pee. They want a price, or they'll refuse to send any more over (cue the joke machine here).

Maybe we now know what happens in that treatment plant?
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If that isn't the :rule10iest argument, I don't know what is.
 
Brian-M said:
If there's already a demand for 100,000,000 tons of Urea per year, why isn't it already being extracted from urine? The only reason I can think of is that it is more economical (and convenient) to produce it synthetically.
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That's exactly it, the urea that is being produced in the body is contaminated with 40x its amount in water. In a factory, it's produced from ammonia and carbon dioxide and produces liquid urea that is then pelletized for sale. The ammonia production process requires removal of water, but not in the same quantities. The ingredients are very cheap, as well: natural gas and air to make ammonia, carbon dioxide with that ammonia to make urea.
 
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