Tough Sell?

[Frim]

You will know when her threats are serious when she says................."Elio, SRK, or ME?"

Difficult choice. Are they all replaceable?

 

[Elio Amazed]

Fracking experiences that weren't muzzled by non-disclosure agreements:

Coming soon to a neighborhood near you.

A few years ago...
A gas well was drilled and activated 150 yds from my parents.
The water immediately changed. And not for the better.
They had to start drinking, and cooking with, bottled water.
And that wasn't even a fracked well.

 

[Muzhik]

Some years back (in the '00s) a group of Russian scientists proposed a theory that oil wasn't merely the remains of ancient plant and animal life ("fossil fuels") but was actually a naturally-occurring geologic process. Bonkers, I know, but wouldn't it be fascinating if oil was, in fact, functionally renewable? Or if not renewable, then growing at a rate that outstrips the current underground reserve estimates.

I'm not advocating "burn it like there's no tomorrow". I'm just pushing the conversation along There is still so much oil in the ground, that natural leaks can be found all over the ocean floor. (No humans involved, just oil bubbling up out of the sea floor like people once found it bubbling up in the midwest).

There is a process known as "thermolytic depolymerization". Plastics, turkey guts, all sorts of things are made of polymers. Plastic is made by taking a simple polymer (crude oil) and extending the polymer chains to form the plastic or other material. The whole bit about fossil fuels being generated over millions of years is a very slow depolymerization process. Thermolytic depolymerization uses heat and pressure to speed up the process. In about a month you can turn a couple of tons of turkey guts (or plastic milk bottles, or whatever) into a couple of barrels of light sweet crude. There was a pilot plant operating in Arkansas that worked and worked well, but was shut down because people in town complained about the smell. Don't know the current state of the research, but know that it's out there.

 

[Elio Amazed]

Thermolytic depolymerization uses heat and pressure to speed up the process.

Heat and Pressure.
Was Energy in < Energy out?
Or was Energy in > Energy out?

"Worked" may, therefore, be a relative term.

I'm pretty sure I know the answer.
But then again, you'd be rid of a couple of tons of garbage...
Even though it might take putting a few ton of combustion byproducts into the air.

How the heck did we start down this road again?

Oh yeah, ours being a reactive species and not a pro-active one...
And many reactive humans believing that crude will be be a infinite resource after all.

Closer to topic, a prolonged spike in gasoline prices might not sell a million Elios...
But in my honest opinion, it sure wouldn't hurt sales.

 

[AriLea]

Well said!
Here is another one to watch:

Well that one includes the Pogue Carburetor. There are others versions of it, to include the FuelVapor tech guys. They participated in the Automotive Xprise, and didn't cut the grade. The Edison2 VLC beat everyone hands-down with out any special tech carburation.
Here's another dive into that subject.. http://fuel-efficient-vehicles.org/energy-news/?page_id=785

About the video above. It's easy to flub up both facts and test results, with many people plenty willing to toss unexplained stats out there just to get a jump out of people. For example the video says 1000mpg in it. Yea, OK, hey we're up to 3000mpg now!, but that statement neglects to mention the use of super-mileage methods, in a specialized super-milling cart, where the real deal going on is firing off the engine for 7 seconds to get up to a total of 10mph and coasting down for about a mile afterward.

Heck, do that yourself, put flow meter on your engine, fire it up until you reach 60, then coast down to 50, and end the test, whalla 100mpg, even in a 1940's ford!

Heck I do that myself. Normally I drive my Prius at 68-78mph and get maybe 43mpg. But when I go a max of the speed limit and use super-mileage methods I can get 70mpg. The car is rated at 54mpg.
You know it's truly evil to make a big hyper-enthusing statement and never give the actual facts that put it into perspective. Then all the head-talking idiots like to pass on this unqualified fourth-person observation willy-nilly. The universe has lots of wonderful secrets in it, this helps keep it that way.

Another example, one I even cheat a bit on, the VW 1 Liter car, gets 317mpg at freeways speeds. Yes, but the freeway of that test was one particular test between two German cities, not on the autobahn. Most likely those are maybe 50mph max speed limits. But since I don't know for sure,... and what direction was the wind and the road grading? anyway it wasn't exactly measured from US mpg standard testing.

In a 42mile commute, I get 10mpg better one way vs the other because the average grading goes better in that direction for my car.

 

[Sethodine]

Even with cheap gas, getting 3x the MPG of my current commuter will do wonders for my wallet. So whether gas is expensive or no, the Elio is a win-win for me.

I'll be paying off my Elio using some sort of payment plan (either the Elio Credit Card, or a traditional auto loan), so my actual savings won't materialize until the E is paid off. But all that time, I'll be driving a NEW car instead of the 1996, 180,000 mile Rav4 I'm driving now.

 

[Muzhik]

Heat and Pressure.
Was Energy in < Energy out?
Or was Energy in > Energy out?

"Worked" may, therefore, be a relative term.

I'm pretty sure I know the answer.
But then again, you'd be rid of a couple of tons of garbage...
Even though it might take putting a few ton of byproducts of combustion into the air.

Apologies. The plant was in Carthage, MO, not Arkansas. According to an article in Discover Magazine, the plant was making 500 barrels per day (79 m3/d) of oil using 270 tons of turkey entrails and 20 tons of hog lard. The yield efficiency was about 85%, i.e., 85 units of fuel were produced for every 15 units of fuel consumed. The plant in Carthage was shut down because of unexpected expenses involved in adding a scrubber to solve issues with smell. In addition they anticipated getting the feedstock (turkey entrails) for free because the material was to be regarded as waste; however, the turkey processing plant found other uses for the entrails and so the company had to buy the entrails for $20 to $40 per ton. The company is currently looking at building a plant in the Netherlands where environmental regulations would make obtaining the feedstock easier (i.e., can't use the stuff for fertilizer or as animal feed.)

 

[Elio Amazed]

Apologies. The plant was in Carthage, MO, not Arkansas. According to an article in Discover Magazine, the plant was making 500 barrels per day (79 m3/d) of oil using 270 tons of turkey entrails and 20 tons of hog lard. The yield efficiency was about 85%, i.e., 85 units of fuel were produced for every 15 units of fuel consumed. The plant in Carthage was shut down because of unexpected expenses involved in adding a scrubber to solve issues with smell. In addition they anticipated getting the feedstock (turkey entrails) for free because the material was to be regarded as waste; however, the turkey processing plant found other uses for the entrails and so the company had to buy the entrails for $20 to $40 per ton. The company is currently looking at building a plant in the Netherlands where environmental regulations would make obtaining the feedstock easier (i.e., can't use the stuff for fertilizer or as animal feed.)

OK, I'm open to taking a look.
If you run across some links, please post them.

I'd also be concerned about cost (facilities, transportation, machinery and payrolls) and environmental impacts.

The other side note is that @ the amount of material required to make 500 barrels...
There may not be enough available refuse in the world to meet the demand for crude.

I just remember hearing the same miracles about converting corn to ethanol...
When our government decided it wanted to push that agenda.

 

[Muzhik]

OK, I'm open to taking a look.
If you run across some links, please post them.

I'd also be concerned about cost (facilities, transportation, machinery and payrolls) and environmental impacts.

The other side note is that @ the amount of material required to make 500 barrels...
There may not be enough available refuse in the world to meet the demand for crude.

I just remember hearing the same miracles about converting corn to ethanol...
When our government decided it wanted to push that agenda.

RE: cost and environmental impacts, you'd have to do more in-depth research than I have time for. Any further plans for conversion facilities will have to take into account the cost of scrubbers to handle any possible complaints of bad smells. The biggest cost in America will be the cost of feedstocks: previous estimates had been based on the assumption that due to the fear of "mad cow" disease, the govt. would prohibit the use of slaughtering byproducts in animal feed and composting. This did not happen. If animal biomass is to be used, the cost of purchasing this former waste product will have to be taken into account.

The system is not limited to animal byproducts. The most efficient use would be in converting plastics into oil. Since most plastics appear to be burned or shredded to be use in a number of other processes, this would be a prime source of feedstock. Other biomass, specifically corn stalks and husks, as well as grain hulls and stalks, lend themselves to this process. It just takes some thinking to come up with simple, easy ways to handle things like transport.

(An example sprang to mind a short time ago while driving home behind a truck salting the roads. There had been a kosher chicken processing plant in the area that had gone bankrupt. The kosher processing produces a LOT of waste salt, which the company needed to pay to have removed. When the region experienced so much snow that the county ran out of road salt, the company donated the salt to the county. The county then didn't have to pay inflated prices for salt, and the plant didn't have to pay to have the salt removed. The only drawback was that sometimes the salter driver had to remove a chicken head or foot from the feeder tube.)

 

[Elio Amazed]

RE: cost and environmental impacts, you'd have to do more in-depth research than I have time for. Any further plans for conversion facilities will have to take into account the cost of scrubbers to handle any possible complaints of bad smells. The biggest cost in America will be the cost of feedstocks: previous estimates had been based on the assumption that due to the fear of "mad cow" disease, the govt. would prohibit the use of slaughtering byproducts in animal feed and composting. This did not happen. If animal biomass is to be used, the cost of purchasing this former waste product will have to be taken into account.

The system is not limited to animal byproducts. The most efficient use would be in converting plastics into oil. Since most plastics appear to be burned or shredded to be use in a number of other processes, this would be a prime source of feedstock. Other biomass, specifically corn stalks and husks, as well as grain hulls and stalks, lend themselves to this process. It just takes some thinking to come up with simple, easy ways to handle things like transport.

(An example sprang to mind a short time ago while driving home behind a truck salting the roads. There had been a kosher chicken processing plant in the area that had gone bankrupt. The kosher processing produces a LOT of waste salt, which the company needed to pay to have removed. When the region experienced so much snow that the county ran out of road salt, the company donated the salt to the county. The county then didn't have to pay inflated prices for salt, and the plant didn't have to pay to have the salt removed. The only drawback was that sometimes the salter driver had to remove a chicken head or foot from the feeder tube.)

One consideration I didn't mention.

500 Barrels of crude weighs approximately 68.75 ton.
290 ton of rufuse material minus 68.75 tons of oil = 221.25 ton
I'm wondering what that 221.21 ton of waste from the process is...
And how it's going to be disposed of (or used).