Occupy Newark Science & Sustainability :SAVING HEAT

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From: monica peregri...@yahoo.com

hey damian, i just happen to have done a lot of passive solar research. the best heat storage materials that i know about that are readily available are some kinds of rock and water.  but i forget and i did see a chart. somewhere. this one comes close:    http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/tables/thrcn.html   and insulation is important of course.  sure i guess an aluminum heated air system is one way to do it. and from my experience (and research) there is nothing quite like a biomass-burning enclosed stove, (wood burning), to warm the body and soul, on a cold rainy night.    of course it would be best to have a catalytic converter on the stack to decrease emissions. lots of heat is lost up the traditional chimney no matter what is burning or how tight the rest of the system is..    of course, too, conservation is key.  this is no help to people who are by nature nocturnal.  and i know a LOT of those.  which opens up another dialogue Why are some people awake in the daytime and others at night?   anyway, soon enough our campers will be focusing on ways to stay COOL.  and i think this same heating aluminum can system, and others, can be  used for cooling as well, using geothermal.    at some point soon we should schedule a TECH MEETING where we talk about this stuff. you have no idea how long i have waited to share this information with other people who are interested.

 

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On Mon, Mar 5, 2012 at 2:49 PM, Damian Decaires <solar...@rocketmail.com> wrote:

yes its a complex formula. 

pressure = rate of flow by opposition to flow.

G = A x V x D x (Tu - Ti) x H

Where G = heat gain

A= vent area

V= velocity of air flow

D= density of the air of fluid

Tu = air intake temp

Ti= outtake temp

H = specific heat of air where H = radiation in wattage** x temp diff of thermal conductor/ ambient

for example lets say 16 guage alum (typical soda can) has a 10 degree diff @ 1000watts per meter square. 

** measured in watts/ M^2

Lets say you turn on the heater in your car at the hottest temp then turn the fan to the highest speed, the air may come in luke warm, but when you turn to the lower speed the air comes in hotter.  What is happening is when lower volume (rate of flow) is passed across the radiator the ration of air / heat gain changes i.e. its not that the radiator got hotter it is that the same heat is delivered with lower heat therefore if there is 10 units of heat distributed with 10 units of air vs. 10 units of heat with 1 unit of air, the low volume actually feels hotter because the ratio went down.  It is possible to jump in a car and try this yourself.

Additionally by switching from a low pressure fan to high pressure air pump we compress the air as it flows which increases the unit D (density).

Additionally I cross referenced this against the BTU rating from spec sheets of existing solar air heaters (such as the cansolair) www.cansolair.com as a sanity check the calc.

But again it still does not yet count as a method yet only a theory.  Which means what we will need to do is construct a unit and using artificial lighting test the performances at various light levels to see actual performance against theoretical constructs. 

Not that I am not into it - this is a very unique theory in that there is no known examples of a solar air heating panel that operates utilizing high pressure.

Secondly take an aquirium air pump and drop the hose 20 feet below the water surface and it will pump air to the bottom of the tank.  Try that with a fan it will never be able to push the air down there because of the weight of all the water pushing back is greater. 

Back in 1994 while still in High School as an intern at Brooklyn Botanic Gardens we received a $10,000 grant from NYC dept of Sanitation for a sealed combustion composter at the back of restaurants, using three 55 gallon drums.  The food waste would be placed in each drum, the first was 0 to 20 days old, second was 20 to 40 and the third was 40 to 60, With the crops of compost being rotated Dept of San. would only need a pickup every 20 days of the finished compost which was 1/10th the volume and the pickups were 20 days apart vs. twice weekly.  The experiment failed because we were pushing the air with fans... 

At the time no one on the team were engineers although we were dedicated and knew if this experiment were to work it could have enormous environmental benefits.  No one figured out that we had to replace the fans with a pump...Secondly no one ever thought of driving hot air solar panel through the compost stack - what this does is cause the stack to accelerate bio reaction (the bacteria become more active at higher temp), which causes the compost bins to heat up and maintain higher temperatures.  Now for example if you look at the link I sent in the last email - this guy took his 55 gallon drums full of water and put them in a foam box and pumped air around the containers into the forced convection system-  very clever and simple. 

Here is where the formula gets complicated - since NO ONE HAS EVER built such a machine- there is no real solid calculation.  THe only way to do it is build the machine and it would be at full scale since volume can affect the rate of bio reaction so therefore a scale test will not yield the formula.  So its reverse engineering - build it first find out what the output is and then with the result known figure out the math backwards from that point..  And it has to be done with over a dozen algebra variables. 

- This is what I mean; im dedicated but something like this will be hard pressed and if I get a job or relocate etc and don't have the time nor someone to step up to replace me.  I speak from experience and been in that situation before. 

---

From: monica <peregri...@yahoo.com>
To: Alink age <alinkag...@gmail.com>; Damian Decaires <solar...@rocketmail.com>
Cc: Dina Rodrigues <ca39dro...@yahoo.com>; "ngtel...@gmail.com" <ngtel...@gmail.com>; "maryg...@gmail.com" <maryg...@gmail.com>; "aircr...@care2.com" <aircr...@care2.com>; Pine Apples <occupypi...@gmail.com>; Pat Fahy <pbf...@gmail.com>; "may...@yahoo.com" <may...@yahoo.com>; "batam.c...@gmail.com" <batam.c...@gmail.com>
Sent: Monday, March 5, 2012 6:20 AM
Subject: Re: Occupy Newark Science & Sustainability :SAVING HEAT

hey damian, i just happen to have done a lot of passive solar research. the best heat storage materials that i know about that are readily available are some kinds of rock and water.  but i forget and i did see a chart. somewhere. this one comes close:    http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/tables/thrcn.html   and insulation is important of course.  sure i guess an aluminum heated air system is one way to do it. and from my experience (and research) there is nothing quite like a biomass-burning enclosed stove, (wood burning), to warm the body and soul, on a cold rainy night.    of course it would be best to have a catalytic converter on the stack to decrease emissions. lots of heat is lost up the traditional chimney no matter what is burning or how tight the rest of the system is..    of course, too, conservation is key.  this is no help to people who are by nature nocturnal.  and i know a LOT of those.  which opens up another dialogue Why are some people awake in the daytime and others at night?   anyway, soon enough our campers will be focusing on ways to stay COOL.  and i think this same heating aluminum can system, and others, can be  used for cooling as well, using geothermal.    at some point soon we should schedule a TECH MEETING where we talk about this stuff. you have no idea how long i have waited to share this information with other people who are interested.

--- On Sun, 3/4/12, Damian Decaires <solar...@rocketmail.com> wrote: From: Damian Decaires <solar...@rocketmail.com> Subject: Re: Occupy Newark Science & Sustainability To: "Alink age" <alinkag...@gmail.com> Cc: "monica monica" <peregri...@yahoo.com>, "Dina Rodrigues" <ca39dro...@yahoo.com>, "ngtel...@gmail.com" <ngtel...@gmail.com>, "maryg...@gmail.com" <maryg...@gmail.com>, "aircr...@care2.com" <aircr...@care2.com>, "Pine Apples" <occupypi...@gmail.com>, "Pat Fahy" <pbf...@gmail.com>, "may...@yahoo.com" <may...@yahoo.com>, "batam.c...@gmail.com" <batam.c...@gmail.com> Date: Sunday, March 4, 2012, 11:35 AM Sorry did not make it - had a gig doing some day labor and it ended up taking all day and being unemployed really could not miss out on the work. As far as materials... 1) if the drums have holes we can plug them send pics showing extent of damage. Building soda can solar panels seems a vain pursuit since the encampment is evicted not to mention unrealistic and undefined business plan.  To be realistic once we have the cans we will need space, tools, capital resources, time (lots of it) to set up a factory line...$$$.  Plus it will need a solid year of prototyping, research and development, testing etc to make sure the machine is viable and working.  Would either prefer to scrap the idea or someone else volunteers to take charge- building a solar panel factory is a lot of work and should not be taken lightly.  Additionally originally estimated 1200 soda can to hit the 50K BTU necessary to heat the military tent and it was raised to 12,000 cans so that people can build their own toys- so the workload is now 10 to 1 increase.  Secondly it is EXPERIMENTAL.  What that means is the first step is not scaling up a factory; the first step is run calculations of what you think it can do, build scale models, check the results and if it is viable then begin scaling up.  Please understand if we go and build these panels while skipping this step then problems may arise, things may not work and everyone would be looking to me for blam That is the honest opinion.  The one thing that really needs to be harped on as rule 1 that everyone must understand-  is that Solar is not the same as a gas line or a utility grid; with the utility grid if we decide we want to consume more power we just drain it down and our electric bill goes up a little.  With solar you get no electricity from the sun when its raining and when it is not raining and the dead of winter there is very little sun- even on a good day the energy is less than half that of the average summer day.  Right now what I have set up for the demo is a battery that can run my laptop for about 8 hr run time and a 40 ft x 2 ft long solar panel which will produce just enough to fill the battery on a sunny day in winter.  Having a backup source such as a pedal power bike to recharge the battery is a good idea so that we can work for the electricity when it is raining- hence why I would like to include that.    As far as actual needs - the peddle bike and deep cycle batteries would be the only things on the list that would be useful to have for the class to conduct experiments as far as  the other materials; As much as I want to be supportive if I end up with a pile of 12 thousand cans and expected to wave a magic wand and it turns to gold; I just don't have the means to do that, The problem is traditional soda can solar air heating modules are not designed to store heat. view link- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRZvAAqzXIw How these work is during the day in winter when the thermostate detects the panel is hotter than the house it sends air from the house through the panel, heats it up and sends it back to the house.  When the household heating system (gas, oil etc) detects that the room temp is hot from the existing thermostat then the existing heater shuts down automatically so that the homowner saves money on their heating bill. On an off grid system we now have to make a panel ten times larger to compensate lack of existing heater and we need to introduce a means to store heat for rainy days... In theory my idea to run the collectors under high pressure vacuum, hybridize to use a triple tank sodium accetate, water, compost bio reactor may in turn make it viable to meet the clients needs but no money no resources, nor patience to take time to go through scale experiments etc...  Its just going to be too much for me. This one guy is going along similar thought pattern and built a similar heat storage device however there is some major differences.  Recommend watching this to better understand multi drum heat storage concept using common parts- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n90Y6Qwab_8&feature=related From: Alink age <alinkag...@gmail.com> To: Damian Decaires <solar...@rocketmail.com> Cc: monica monica <peregri...@yahoo.com>; Dina Rodrigues <ca39dro...@yahoo.com>; ngtel...@gmail.com; maryg...@gmail.com; aircr...@care2.com; Pine Apples <occupypi...@gmail.com>; Pat Fahy <pbf...@gmail.com>; may...@yahoo.com; batam.c...@gmail.com Sent: Saturday, March 3, 2012 10:47 PM Subject: Occupy Newark Science & Sustainability Peace Damian,   I hope all is well with you. Was hoping to have seen you at today's meeting. Not sure if you forgot or not. I will follow up with a phone call as well.   Well, we had a very productive meeting. A lot was discussed and planned. There were a lot of questions regarding the solar technology project and I wasn't quite sure how to answer them, especially being that you're spearheading this and the specialist on the topic.   People wanted to know more specifics about the materials that are being collected:  12,000 uncrushed soda cans 20 55-gallon plastic barrels 10 aquarium air pumps 2 deep cycle battery (found at forklift suppliers or rental stores maybe) 1 advanced ultra-efficient mini fridge 1 solar cooker sodium acetate hand warmers 1 Peddle Power Energy Bike as used during the encampment at Liberty Square Park   How exactly do we plan to use these materials? Also, can any of these materials be suplemented for something else?   Those were just two of the questions that I can remember. Dina will be setting up a Google group so that our communication is shared with all those in the group. Our next meeting will be on Saturday, March 17, 2012.   Also, Monica is going to create a flyer for the solar technology teach-in. I also need some information regarding the teach-in so that I can email it to the guy at NCC so he can lock in the dates.   If you could answer the questions below I'd greatly appreciate it and it would help secure the following dates:   Monday,  March 26, 2012  Wednesday, March 28, 2012 Monday, April 2, 2012 Wednesday, April 4, 2012.   The time of the teach-ins for all days is 5:30pm - 7:30pm.   Day 1: Monday, March 26, 2012 What do you plan to cover on the first day of this teach-in series? Keep in mind that we have 2 hours.    Day 2: Wednesday, March 28, 2012 What do you plan to cover on day two of this teach-in series? Keep in mind that we have 2 hours.   Day 3: Monday, April 2, 2012 What do you plan to cover on day three of this teach-in series? Keep in mind that we have 2 hours.     Day 4: Wednesday, April 4, 2012 What do you plan to cover on day four of this teach-in series? Keep in mind that we have 2 hours.

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“The paradox of education is precisely this: that as one begins to become conscious, one begins to examine the society in which he is being educated.” 

—James A. Baldwin

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From: Damian Decaires <solar...@rocketmail.com>