Environmemntal Benefits of DM and PRT

[Jay Andress]

Has anyone done any estimates of the environmental benefits of DM or PRT. With the recent UN report on climate change and the start of the talks to replace Kyoto (next month in Bali) climate change will gets lots of interest.

  I have done some work with the MonoMobile on estimating the global warming benefits. It is very crude estimates that will probably make most scientists in this group cringe. Some basic numbers that I have discovered over the years. The average gasoline vehicle emits 7 tons of CO2 each year. Does anyone know how much CO2 is in a KWH generated from coal, oil, natural gas? Does anyone know what the average CO2 per KWH would be? (About 50% of electricity in the US is generated from coal, 20% from nuclear, oil is 25% and hydro/renewables are 5%.). We estimate that the average MonoMobile (with allowances for the benefits of drafting) uses 45 amps at 460 volts. so amps x volts=watts...45x460=20,700 watts (or 20.7 kwh) At an average cost of 8.5 cents per KWH the cost to run the MonoMobile is $1.75 per hour. During that hour I estimate that the vehicle will go 100 miles.If we know how much CO2 is generated per KWH then I think we can calculate the reduction in CO2 emissions from DM.

  Has anyone done similar work with PRT?

  AS WE MAKE THE CASE FOR DM AND/OR PRT THIS NUMBER WILL BECOME VERY IMPORTANT IN THE NEAR FUTURE!!!!

--
new contact info: andress.jay @gmail.com

[Dennis Manning]

Jay:

 

Speaking CO2 this could have major implications at the Federal level:

 

On November 15, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit rejected the fuel economy standard for sport utility vehicles, minivans, and pickup trucks established by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) because, among other things, of the failure of the agency to assign any benefit to reduction of carbon dioxide emissions in its cost-benefit analysis.  Center for Biological Diversity v. Nat’l Highway Traffic Safety Administration, No. 06-71891 (9th Cir. Nov. 15, 2007).  The court also held that the Environmental Assessment prepared by the agency was inadequate to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and that the agency must instead prepare a full Environmental Impact Statement.  The case may be expected to have widespread implications to the extent it stands for the proposition that federal agencies must account for greenhouse gas emissions, such as carbon dioxide emissions, during the regulatory process.

 

For full story see:

 

http://www.envoynews.com/nossaman/e_article000957215.cfm?x=bbFCMcS,b58CT5fh

 

Dennis

[Jerry Schneider]

Palle Jensen has a nice section on this subject at:
http://www.ruf.dk/rufstatus.pdf
SkyWeb Express provides no detail in their Feasibility Study, see
page 27 -- link on my main page.

I agree that everyone should give emphasis and any available detail
on this topic at their website.

- Jerry Schneider -
Innovative Transportation Technologies
http://faculty.washington.edu/jbs/itrans

[Jay Andress]

Dennis,

 

   Good point. I have also followed this. I believe that there is also another case over the right of the state governments (particularly California and New England states) to try and establish regulations for CO2 emissions. The way I understand the issue is :

     The automobile companies are arguing that fuel regulations are already regulated by the federal government. That the state regulations are invalid because when both the state and federal government regulate the same item, the federal law controls. The automobile industry argues that the only way to reduce CO2 emissions is to improve gasoline mileage, therefore the state CO2 regulations are in conflict with the fuel standards. I believe that the automobile industry is also losing this case. Toyota is catching lots of flack over this issue because they have joined the other automobile companies trying to stop the state regulations of CO2.

      The momentum is building in all areas on this climate change issue...international, national, local, UN, Nobel Prize, judicial, legislative... with a likely Democrat in the White House it will be deafening. It is really hard to believe that this level of public interest can be maintained without real change. 

 

                                                                      Jay

[Jack Slade]

If you are talking long-term....20 years or more... those figures are not too important, because we know that CO2 emissions from nuclear is zero, and oil and natural gas will be too expensive to use, as well as scarce.  The sulphur emissions from coal make it extremely undesirable. Somebody last week mentioned the deadly emissions from nuclear plants. This is mis-information, as it just plain isn't so. The best places to fish in winter is in the warm run-off from the nuclear plants, and the fish are not polluted.

 

A study in Ontario, Canada, 2 years ago concluded that rapid expansion of our nuclear reactors is mandatory, and it has already started. Coal-fired facitilities are being shut down.  Those people in San Francisco are alarmists, not scientists. Ontario already gets 53% of it's power from nuclear.

 

Jack Slade

Jay Andress <andre...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Guala Luca]

Jay,
for the Masdar project we have done this evaluation. I cannot reval the data at this point (I eventually will later) but the results are stunning. The PRT in Masdar will be entirely powered from zero carbon or low carbon renewable energies (sun, wind and waste) so there will be little or no CO2 production.

as for CO2 production of various fuels the chemistry is as follows:
1 kg of pure hydrogen (H2) + 8 kg of oxigen (O2) produce 9 kg of water vapour (H2O) + 33.3 kWh of energy;
1 kg of carbon (C) + 2.67 kg of O2 produce 3.67 kg of H2O + 9.4 kWh
1 kg of "average" petrol (gasoline) + 3.5 kg of O2 = 3.1 kg of CO2 + 1.4 kg of H2O + 13.2 kWh
Of course not not all petrols are identical and not all combustions are complete, N2 takes part to chemical reactions etc. etc.
to compare petrol with diesel fuel: the complete combustion of 1 litre (=760g) of petrol produces 2.3 kg of CO2 while 1 litre of diesel fuel (=790g) produces 2.7 kg of CO2. Quantities may vary depending on the composition of the fuels. Carbon, as far as I know, produces roughly twice the amount of CO2 as diesel fuel per kWh generated.
I hope this helps. I know these are not homogenous data and difficult to put together but the Masdar PRT project is keeping me so busy that I have no time to browse better through my data!
cheers, LUca

-----Messaggio originale-----
Da: transport-...@googlegroups.com per conto di Jay Andress
Inviato: mar 20/11/2007 18.56
A: transport-...@googlegroups.com
Cc:
Oggetto: [t-i] Environmemntal Benefits of DM and PRT

[Jay Andress]

Guala,

 

   Thanks for the information. I'll throw it together with some of my other information to try to reach some conclusions. At some future time would like to see the results of your in-depth study. It seems very ironic and predictive that the Masdar project will not use any oil....

 

                                                                        Jay

[Guala Luca]

Jay,

> Thanks for the information. I'll throw it together with some of my other information to try to reach some conclusions. At some future time would like to see the results of your in-depth study. It seems very ironic and predictive that the Masdar project will not use any oil....

the Emirates, but especially Abu Dhabi, are very keen on alternative sources of energy. Our client for Masdar is the "Abu Dhabi Future Energy Company" an offspring of Mubadala entirely devoted to research on non-fossil, renewable and sustainable energy sources and energy management.
No day goes by without an article appearing on the Gulf News saying that some initiative has been started, or some money has been assigned, to research on new energy sources. Clearly, they know something about fossil fuel resources that we don't know.
cheers, Luca

[Jerry Roane]

Luca

What is the source of your diesel data? The information I have
indicates that it takes as much energy (CO2 is pretty much linear with
energy burned) to produce a BTU of liquid fuel as the fuel contains. If
this is true there is no way your published numbers can jive with that,
from an algebra standpoint. It is conceivable but unlikely that the
numbers are true if your analysis stops at the torque converter bolts
and you are running a mythical diesel engine small enough for road use.
The most energy efficient diesel engine I found so far is an ocean
tanker with 36 inch diameter pistons. It is rated at 50% efficiency.
The only legitimate way to publish the comparative CO2 emissions and
other deadly toxins is to include the real world use of such devices. I
contend most diesel powered vehicles produce more well to
upholstery-seat CO2 than the average overall gasoline CO2 and other
toxins harmful to our health and environment. If you start at the
liquid fuel pump and end at the bolts from the engine crank shaft to the
torque converter bolts your numbers will be closer to correct but in
realityland we really need to take a system level look at the problem if
the result according to the Nobel Peace Prize folks is global in
nature. The two sides have to be considered globally and the most
important part of that is HOW it is being used NOW on AVERAGE (globally).

If NOx is 245 times more harming than CO2 for the air then even
considering CO2 in an analysis without at least a mention of the other
much more harmful gas seems like a lobby effort rather than truth
seeking. I just hope to find truth so we as a world can make sound
decisions. It is a complex issue so boiling down damage to one chemical
(gas) is too simplistic. This is especially true if we are to alter our
very lives over too simplistic of a model. I am looking for real data
if you have some that is global in nature. I do know the air in Paris
is literally blue and I cannot help but think it is from the diesel cars
and trucks of 8 million people. It is blue for some reason. It would
be a shame to have Masdar with blue air also so your renewable energy
for transport is a great thing.

The other side of what the emirates may know is oil sells for $100 a
barrel and they can produce "free energy" for less money. Since they
have the up front investment capital it makes perfect sense to sell oil
to stupid gluttonous Americans for a rip off price and produce the
energy they need without getting blue air. I doubt it is because they
have pumped their last barrel in 2006 and the storage tank is draining
down to empty.

Jerry Roane

[Guala Luca]

Jerry,
the data I posted come from a chemistry book. They do not account for engine efficiency: that's another pair of trousers. Also the CO2 and H2O figures refer to a complete combustion, so no NOx, no CO, no VOC.
When I wrote that "the full combustion of .... produces" I meant exactly that. The rest is your assumptions.
ciao
Luca

-----Messaggio originale-----
Da: transport-...@googlegroups.com per conto di Jerry Roane
Inviato: ven 23/11/2007 16.04
A: transport-...@googlegroups.com
Cc:
Oggetto: [t-i] Re: RIF: [t-i] Environmemntal Benefits of DM and PRT

[Jay Andress]

That is pretty amazing...that the OPEC countries are leading the way to developing non-fossil, renewable and sustainable energy sources. What is just as amazing is that Texas A&M University, probably the premier engineering program in the world for oil recovery technology has established the CEETI department to explore dual mode technology. I suspect that oil reserves could be less than is publicly revealed...or that these organizations realize that the world will move away from oil as it gets more expensive.

[rober...@aol.com]

Luca, in the second line you state that 1 kilo of carbon plus 2.67 O2  will produce water and energy. Did I miss something or are we short some inputed H2 and a home for the Carbon.  Unless you've got fusion figured out, you got me stumped.
Best Regards,
Robert Pulliam
Tubular Rail

On Nov 21, 2007 2:40 PM, Guala Luca <gu...@systematica.net> wrote:

Jay,
for the Masdar project we have done this evaluation. I cannot reval the data at this point (I eventually will later) but the results are stunning. The PRT in Masdar will be entirely powered from zero carbon or low carbon renewable energies (sun, wind and waste) so there will be little or no CO2 production.

as for CO2 production of various fuels the chemistry is as follows:
1 kg of pure hydrogen (H2) + 8 kg of oxigen (O2) produce 9 kg of water vapour (H2O) + 33.3 kWh of energy;
1 kg of carbon (C) + 2.67 kg of O2 produce 3.67 kg of H2O + 9.4 kWh
1 kg of "average" petrol (gasoline) + 3.5 kg of O2 = 3.1 kg of CO2 + 1.4 kg of H2O + 13.2 kWh
Of course not not all petrols are identical and not all combustions are complete, N2 takes part to chemical reactions etc. etc.
to compare petrol with diesel fuel: the complete combustion of 1 litre (=760g) of petrol produces 2.3 kg of CO2 while 1 litre of diesel fuel (=790g) produces 2.7 kg of CO2. Quantities may vary depending on the composition of the fuels. Carbon, as far as I know, produces roughly twice the amount of CO2 as diesel fuel per kWh generated.
I hope this helps. I know these are not homogenous data and difficult to put together but the Masdar PRT project is keeping me so busy that I have no time to browse better through my data!
cheers, LUca

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[Guala Luca]

Robert,
you are correct. I should have written CO2 where I wrote H2O. You can check the masses: 1 kg of C + 2.67 kg of O2 = 3.67 kg of whatever it is (CO2 of course). strange that no one else noticed....
I took these data from a lesson I did last year at the Uni of Milan: I wanted to show the students (architecture) that H2 produces LOTS of energy plus water, while C produced a bit of energy plus CO2. Petrol and Diesel fuel are just a mix of H2 and C: all the CO2 comes from C but most of the energy comes from H2. So, if we were able to do our own mix we would put more H2 and less C
cheers, Luca

-----Messaggio originale-----
Da: transport-...@googlegroups.com per conto di rober...@aol.com
Inviato: gio 29/11/2007 6.08
A: transport-...@googlegroups.com
Cc:
Oggetto: [t-i] Re: RIF: [t-i] Environmemntal Benefits of DM and PRT

new contact info: andress.jay @ gmail.com <http://gmail.com/>









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[rober...@aol.com]

Okay I accept that but isn't the problem with the H2 economy the energy required to isolate/produce the H2?

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[Guala Luca]

Robert,

> Okay I accept that but isn't the problem with the H2 economy the energy required to isolate/produce the H2?

Indeed it is. When we use fossil fuel, we are actually exploiting the work of millions of billions of tons of forestry that several hundreds of millions of years ago exploited solar energy to transform the CO2 in the atmosphere and the H2 in the water into sugars (releasing huge quantities of oxigen which, by the way, poisoned much of the animal life of the time and sparked a frantic race to evolution), and then the work of the eons that transformed sugars into hydrocarbons. If we want to make H2 ourselves, we must provide our own energy.
That was at the end of my lesson. I compared the "well to wheel" efficiency of fuel cells fed by H2 produced by means of electrolysis with batteries, and of fuel cells fed by H2 from reforming of methane with methane powered ICE and concluded that there wasn't any energetical advantage, at the moment.
cheers, Luca