Forum Index > Public Lands Stewardship > Energy Sources/Improvements on the Horizon
 Reply to topic
Previous :: Next Topic
Author Message
touron
Member
Member


Joined: 15 Sep 2003
Posts: 10293 | TRs | Pics
Location: Plymouth Rock
touron
Member
PostTue Mar 29, 2011 10:38 am 
Minnesota researchers are a key step closer to making renewable petroleum fuels using bacteria, sunlight and carbon dioxide.

Touron is a nougat of Arabic origin made with almonds and honey or sugar, without which it would just not be Christmas in Spain.
Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
alpinelakes
Member
Member


Joined: 07 Jun 2009
Posts: 414 | TRs | Pics
Location: Seahurst
alpinelakes
Member
PostWed Apr 06, 2011 3:44 pm 
"More nuclear!" Yeah, we're all over that. The UW is picking up iodine and cessium particles with their air filters RIGHT NOW! Plutonium is on the way! Isn't that great news? This years snowpack now has a radioactive icing on top. It will be in our water supply all summer. What's not to like?

Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
straydog
slave to a monolith



Joined: 19 Apr 2008
Posts: 1456 | TRs | Pics
Location: North Bend
straydog
slave to a monolith
PostFri Apr 15, 2011 10:45 pm 
Maybe your windows in the future will provide power to your house: Solar Power Without Solar Cells: A Hidden Magnetic Effect of Light Could Make It Possible A dramatic and surprising magnetic effect of light discovered by University of Michigan researchers could lead to solar power without traditional semiconductor-based solar cells.

Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
touron
Member
Member


Joined: 15 Sep 2003
Posts: 10293 | TRs | Pics
Location: Plymouth Rock
touron
Member
PostThu Apr 21, 2011 9:49 pm 
Lasers instead of sparkplugs?

Touron is a nougat of Arabic origin made with almonds and honey or sugar, without which it would just not be Christmas in Spain.
Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
Backpacker Joe
Blind Hiker



Joined: 16 Dec 2001
Posts: 23956 | TRs | Pics
Location: Cle Elum
Backpacker Joe
Blind Hiker
PostThu Apr 28, 2011 6:24 am 
Ya like that will happen! Why is that cool??? That's just one trouble with the left. They think that just because they want something and then legislate it the technology will simply emerge because they want it to.

"If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen we must live through all time or die by suicide." — Abraham Lincoln
Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
alpinelakes
Member
Member


Joined: 07 Jun 2009
Posts: 414 | TRs | Pics
Location: Seahurst
alpinelakes
Member
PostSat Apr 30, 2011 6:15 pm 
"trouble with the left" Hmmm. We once had a fantastic transit system throughout much of this country. Streetcars, Cablecars, Railways. The bus and tire mafia, comprised of greedy right wing industrialists, decided that we should rip out all the pretty cable cars and romantic trolley systems and replace them with incredibly inefficient, toxin-spewing, detroit mafia internal combustion powered privacy bubbles. Used to be able to take the train to Stevens Pass. Gas Mafia says you can't do that no more. Then there used to be a bus. Now that's gone, too. Hmmm. Well, I betcha that's one'a them there mafias behind that, too! We dreamed up the technology to go to the bright, shiny moon. Nothin' leftist about it. But we can't solve our environmental crisis, because it would be "leftist"? We legislated 30 mpg cars back in the 70s. The technology was already in place, but the right wing Motor Vehicle Mafia weaseled out of it. They had a brilliant plan to out compeet the emerging japanese auto mafias. Blew it, of course- now they're among the the most gluttonous of the useless eaters who comprise the parasitic, corporate welfare state. So, we're incinerating neighborhoods worldwide to keep the old order in place. Seems reasonable, I guess. Change is too terrifying to contemplate. May as well just keep poisoning the atmosphere until it bursts into flame. Presumably this will show the leftists the error of their ways...

Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
skookum olympus
Member
Member


Joined: 01 Jul 2009
Posts: 246 | TRs | Pics
skookum olympus
Member
PostSat Apr 30, 2011 6:28 pm 
Backpacker Joe wrote:
Ya like that will happen! Why is that cool??? That's just one trouble with the left. They think that just because they want something and then legislate it the technology will simply emerge because they want it to.
Sometimes, technology does arise because someone wants it to. Sometimes, it happens on accident, but often, people working very hard to accomplish something actually do what they set out to do - and sometimes it makes the world a better place. It's rather neat that way. Those crazy liberals.

..... to be whole and harmonious, man must also know the music of the beaches and the woods. He must find the thing of which he is only an infinitesimal part and nurture it and love it, if he is to live. ~Wm. O. Douglas
Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
whitebark
Member
Member


Joined: 08 Jul 2005
Posts: 1864 | TRs | Pics
Location: Seattle
whitebark
Member
PostTue May 03, 2011 10:09 am 
Well the technology is not new, but plain old photovoltaic cells and panels keep getting cheaper, both traditional crystalline designs and new thin-film types. Production now has, without much fanfare or attention from the press, reached gigawatt levels. It's a quiet revolution!

Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
MtnGoat
Member
Member


Joined: 17 Dec 2001
Posts: 11992 | TRs | Pics
Location: Lyle, WA
MtnGoat
Member
PostMon May 09, 2011 1:24 pm 
alpinelakes wrote:
"More nuclear!" Yeah, we're all over that. The UW is picking up iodine and cessium particles with their air filters RIGHT NOW! Plutonium is on the way! Isn't that great news? This years snowpack now has a radioactive icing on top. It will be in our water supply all summer. What's not to like?
A very good example of why not to build any new obsolete reactor designs. Gosh I am sure glad we can all agree on that!

Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie' until you can find a rock. - Will Rogers
Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
MtnGoat
Member
Member


Joined: 17 Dec 2001
Posts: 11992 | TRs | Pics
Location: Lyle, WA
MtnGoat
Member
PostMon May 09, 2011 1:33 pm 
alpinelakes wrote:
"trouble with the left" Hmmm. We once had a fantastic transit system throughout much of this country. Streetcars, Cablecars, Railways. The bus and tire mafia, comprised of greedy right wing industrialists, decided that we should rip out all the pretty cable cars and romantic trolley systems and replace them with incredibly inefficient, toxin spewing, detroit mafia internal combustion powered privacy bubbles.
Sure, fantastic if you lived only where they went and didn't mind running your life by someone elses schedule. Outside of this, things got real messy real fast. Don't want to live in an urban core, a perfectly valid and eminently sane decision? Well the mass transit thing falls apart pretty rapidly then, too. Instead, now we can choose flexibility and instantaneous gratification of our transportation desires and put it ahead of efficiency, as anyone has a god given right to do. Ditto on privacy...which a lot of people prefer. We're not here to be told how to socialize or who to socialize with or even to socialize at all if we don't damned well feel like it, no matter what many of our would be self appointed betters say about it. I'm sure a lot of people don't mind running your life by a transit schedule and winding up with a wino drooling on you, some skeeze staring at the stuff you're trying to get home from the store, the guy mumbling to himself in the corner in the seat that smells like he hasn't left it soon enough...the reality of the non privacy is not preferred by a lot of people and for very good reason. Sure, in some places people choose to do this. Good for them. Let them choose it, and let them pay full price for the ride, too. Does this excuse the malfeasance in the cases where public transportation was denied it's chance to compete? Nope. It doesn't. But let's not slobber all over collectivized, efficiency over choice, rote schedule over instant flexibility unduly either.
alpinelakes wrote:
We dreamed up the technology to go to the bright, shiny moon. Nothin' leftist about it. But we can't solve our environmental crisis, because it would be "leftist"?
Why, yes, now that you mention it that is correct. The solutions are almost always leftist and thus anti individual and pro Statist.

Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie' until you can find a rock. - Will Rogers
Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
straydog
slave to a monolith



Joined: 19 Apr 2008
Posts: 1456 | TRs | Pics
Location: North Bend
straydog
slave to a monolith
PostTue May 10, 2011 5:54 pm 
Yep... there are now 3-4 companies with various forms of fuel cell technology and they're working on making it cheap enough for homes. Seems like the biggest challenge right now is getting enough volume to bring the cost down along with making them reliable and low maintenance.

Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
straydog
slave to a monolith



Joined: 19 Apr 2008
Posts: 1456 | TRs | Pics
Location: North Bend
straydog
slave to a monolith
PostTue May 10, 2011 6:31 pm 
yeah... it's a little misleading... the supporting system for those little cubes is a bit bigger than a large home air conditioning system lol.gif

Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
MtnGoat
Member
Member


Joined: 17 Dec 2001
Posts: 11992 | TRs | Pics
Location: Lyle, WA
MtnGoat
Member
PostTue May 10, 2011 6:44 pm 
Blue Dome wrote:
It's impressive and enlightening to see him standing there holding two small cubes and saying they'll power one average U.S. home, or two Eurpoean homes, or four to six Asian homes.
That's an interesting technology. Would be lovely to see if it can compete. I wonder what the net ratio is for energy into the cubes vs out. On another note, it's great to see the US leading in homes as well.

Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie' until you can find a rock. - Will Rogers
Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
straydog
slave to a monolith



Joined: 19 Apr 2008
Posts: 1456 | TRs | Pics
Location: North Bend
straydog
slave to a monolith
PostTue May 10, 2011 9:51 pm 
Some encouraging news on the Fusion front... I've read about this device and at first glance it seemed like a stretch, but maybe it's got possibilities. Fusion goes forward from the fringe A Navy-funded effort to harness nuclear fusion power reports that its unconventional plasma device is operating as designed and generating "positive results" more than halfway through the project.

Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
MtnGoat
Member
Member


Joined: 17 Dec 2001
Posts: 11992 | TRs | Pics
Location: Lyle, WA
MtnGoat
Member
PostWed May 11, 2011 4:18 pm 
I read up on the polywell method last year, it is pretty fascinating. Basically the cube of joined rings creates a containment field with a deep energy 'well' inside which it is tough for particles to climb back out of. This containment is what theoretically contains the reaction enough for it to keep going for a change.

Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie' until you can find a rock. - Will Rogers
Back to top Reply to topic Reply with quote Send private message
   All times are GMT - 8 Hours
 Reply to topic
Forum Index > Public Lands Stewardship > Energy Sources/Improvements on the Horizon
  Happy Birthday speyguy, Bandanabraids!
Jump to:   
Search this topic:

You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum