Has the US Navy just quietly solved the oil crisis?

[LSSBB]

Remember the system inefficiencies. The only way any of this is even carbon neutral is if the source of your electrical power is carbon free. If you are talking about nuclear Carriers using off-peak excess power to generate jet-fuel, then yes, its a carbon neutral source of fuel (and very useful, if limited in application). If you are talking a port or harbor facility that uses local grid power to produce fuel for fleet vehicles, then, not so much so, as most grid power contains some portion of fossil fuel generated electrical power.

Carbon neutral is better than no change at all but really won't address the "problem of carbon in the atmosphere."

Those inefficiencies are why I said "reduce", not eliminate.

 

[Craig B]

Not carbon neutral, uses one of the dirtiest fuels to produce a dirty liquid fuel with a lot of previously sequestered carbon output into the active carbon cycle. Coal and petroleum need to be left in the ground.

I didn't mean that. I was just using the Shanxi example to show that methanol in itself is a useful product. As already indicated I envisaged the power source being surpluses of intermittent-source power (eg wind or wave) or combinations of Icelandic hydro power and volcanic CO2. Iceland can generate much more electricity, from renewables alone, than it could possibly use. There is no cable connecting it with European or N American grids; but it could export methanol very easily. I just wondered if this was a feasible proposition.

 

[ThunderChunky]

I didn't mean that. I was just using the Shanxi example to show that methanol in itself is a useful product. As already indicated I envisaged the power source being surpluses of intermittent-source power (eg wind or wave) or combinations of Icelandic hydro power and volcanic CO2. Iceland can generate much more electricity, from renewables alone, than it could possibly use. There is no cable connecting it with European or N American grids; but it could export methanol very easily. I just wondered if this was a feasible proposition.

Yes, methanol in general makes a lot of sense.

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

 

[BenBurch]

The modifications for propane (C₃H₈) work just as well for Methane (CH₄) and methane is much more simple to produce (CO2 + 2 H2O → CH4 + 2 O2). Liquefied Methane, is a low-level cryogen. You'll want low-pressurized (~3psi), insulated tanks. Liquefied methane, in terms of energy density, contains, per volume, about 60% the energy content of diesel fuel, which is problematic, but not insurmountable.

Union Pacific is putting a tank car "tender" between pairs of locomotives modified for LNG.

 

[Trakar]

Union Pacific is putting a tank car "tender" between pairs of locomotives modified for LNG.

Though I'd prefer electrified rail, that is a long-overdue and much welcomed practice!!

 

[BenBurch]

Though I'd prefer electrified rail, that is a long-overdue and much welcomed practice!!

Found this image via google image search; http://donstrack.smugmug.com/UtahRails/Union-Pacific/UP-Fuel-Tenders/i-6vfBmRs

 

[Trakar]

Found this image via google image search; http://donstrack.smugmug.com/UtahRails/Union-Pacific/UP-Fuel-Tenders/i-6vfBmRs

The first view that pops up with that link is to a diesel tender, but clinking the back arrow on the frame leds to a spread of what I'm assuming are the LNG tenders?

 

[Craig B]

The first view that pops up with that link is to a diesel tender, but clinking the back arrow on the frame leds to a spread of what I'm assuming are the LNG tenders?

I wondered at that, because the heavy exhaust haze doesn't look like LPG. Thanks.

 

[Craig B]

Though I'd prefer electrified rail, that is a long-overdue and much welcomed practice!!

Seems to be happening.

Liquefied natural gas, or LNG, may soon replace diesel in most of the country’s freight locomotives, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said Monday.

“It’s still relatively much cheaper than the diesel-gallon equivalent,” EIA economist Nicholas Chase says.

In fact, if LNG prices remain as low as they are, some rail companies believe the conversion could happen as quickly as “the dieselization revolution of the 1940s and ‘50s,” when huge numbers of trains were converted from steam to diesel, Chase says.

See http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/data-mine/2014/04/15/natural-gas-rolls-into-world-of-freight-rail

 

[tyr_13]

It's a matter of the source of the energy.

If you have plenty of cheap wind power you are not using when it is very windy, then it is a much more viable proposition than if you are building extra capacity just to do it.

Right. And this would be true for more than wind power. As a primary product it might not be competitive or efficient for traditional uses. However as a co-product, it could be very useful and increase the overall efficiency of the system, be it nuclear, solar, wind, hydro, etc.

 

[Marcus]

Seems to be happening. See http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/data-mine/2014/04/15/natural-gas-rolls-into-world-of-freight-rail

Thanks to fracking, natural gas production is very high, especially here in Texas. I would much rather this product turned into LNG rather than burned off.

 

[BenBurch]

The first view that pops up with that link is to a diesel tender, but clinking the back arrow on the frame leds to a spread of what I'm assuming are the LNG tenders?

Oh! Ooops. Yes, I didn't look closely enough!

 

[Trakar]

Oh! Ooops. Yes, I didn't look closely enough!

So long as it was biodiesel with a soot filter on the exhaust (which they generally do with regular diesel in these trains, do they not?). Soot filters should be used with all diesel engines. Just my little PSA for the day.

 

[Trakar]

Thanks to fracking, natural gas production is very high, especially here in Texas. I would much rather this product turned into LNG rather than burned off.

Anything that shuts down coal just as fast as we can. in another couple decades we'll need to wean off that teat as well, but right now it's modern civilization's coal-methadone.

 

[Aepervius]

Anything that shuts down coal just as fast as we can. in another couple decades we'll need to wean off that teat as well, but right now it's modern civilization's coal-methadone.

We have had a way to wean off (at least to great part) coal, oil and gas for electricity generation. Instead in the last few years we have been abandonning that, out of exagerated fears, instead went back to coal.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

Can cars not easily be converted to use methanol? It's the Indy 500 fuel.

Actually, if the Navy is producing Jet fuel, the analogue would be diesel. Indy Cars use methanol because they run piston engines at very high RPMs and can extinguish the fires from crashes with plain water. (and can because they use special materials and lubricants) You can run an ordinary car on methanol, but not for long without modifications. It is too corrosive. Methanol can be converted to diesel. However, by the sounds of it, the Navy has a way to make jet fuel. Not sure if that means they produce methanol first and then convert it to Jet Fuel (diesel) or not. Sounds like they are going straight to longer chain unsaturated hydrocarbons. (Jet B?) Much more octane in Jet fuel, and in piston engines like diesels, runs at much lower RPMs and higher torques. Perfect for trucking/shipping or any other relatively low rpm/high torque application. But if they are making an analogue to Jet B it would be far too dangerous for normal public use.

The University of Texas has come up with a way to combine solar with CO2 at high efficiency to make methanol and then use standard techniques to convert that to diesel. CO2 and sunlight I would be curious how closely related that is to the Navy project?

 

[Trakar]

We have had a way to wean off (at least to great part) coal, oil and gas for electricity generation. Instead in the last few years we have been abandonning that, out of exagerated fears, instead went back to coal.

The main problem with nuclear is that most of our nuclear power plants are slightly modified 50+ year old designs. I've always been strongly pro-nuclear power, but I would not be if that meant refurbished Gen II and Gen III systems. If you are talking GenIV and beyond systems, we should have been building them like Starbucks for the last two decades.

 

[Trakar]

Jet fuel is basically kerosene.

 

[BenBurch]

So long as it was biodiesel with a soot filter on the exhaust (which they generally do with regular diesel in these trains, do they not?). Soot filters should be used with all diesel engines. Just my little PSA for the day.

In fact there are major changes being made to road (that is, main line) diesels to address soot and other emissions.

 

[Trakar]

In fact there are major changes being made to road (that is, main line) diesels to address soot and other emissions.

I've been impressed with the strides that the railway industry has taken over the last several decades, apparently, largely of their own initiative.