Odd solar power?

[c1ue]

Re: Odd solar power?

Perhaps you are over-estimating it?
The issue is not that Americans will not cut back on energy use---> we have been doing it for half a decade at least...

The recent 'fall' of per capita US energy use is anything but significant or even necessarily real.

http://www.eia.gov/totalenergy/data/...df/sec1_13.pdf

Note that while the per capita amount has fallen from peak - it is still very much higher than was seen anytime in the '90s, which in turn is significantly more than the 'golden' '70s.

[aaron]

Re: Odd solar power?

I thought the theory was that natural gas is in a financial bubble of sorts and its price will go up substantially in the future. Has this itulip idea been given up?

Perhaps our dear leaders are smart and read EJs site among others. They know NG is a non-starter. Why fit out stations for NG when it is going to be as expensive as gasoline in a few years?

Why not just build more NG-fueled electric plants and continue to encourage EV technology going forward? It seems ludicrous to compress gas, transport it to a station, where it must be kept compressed, and then put it into autos. How much energy is lost in the various conversions? Is it more or less than the EV equivalent? Is LNG liquid at room temperature/air pressure?

[thriftyandboringinohio]

Re: Odd solar power?

...It seems ludicrous to compress gas, transport it to a station, where it must be kept compressed, and then put it into autos. How much energy is lost in the various conversions? Is it more or less than the EV equivalent? Is LNG liquid at room temperature/air pressure?

The natgas is not compressed first and then moved. It is moved by existing low-pressure pipeline to the fueling station and compressed there. It takes about 3% of the energy in the fuel to compress it to 3600 psi. You can think of that as a 3% energy loss. Fuel compressors come in two styles -fast fill and slow fill. Fast fill compressor stations can fill a car in a few minutes. They are big and expensive, with large motors and compressors and sets of cascade tanks all under automatic control.



You'll need one at each retail location.
Slow fill takes hours to fill the car, but the equipment is a tiny cheap compressor and the experience is much like charging an electric car all day.
You need one for each car or two or three, much like an EV battery charger.


LNG is not a liquid at room temp. It's a cryogenic fluid, at atmospheric pressure it's at -260 deg F / -162 C. It must be stored in vacuum insulated bottles, and even then it boils off constantly and must be vented or consumed. No additive to give odor survives those low temps, so LNG becomes an odorless gas, you can't smell a leak.

[c1ue]

Re: Odd solar power?

I thought the theory was that natural gas is in a financial bubble of sorts and its price will go up substantially in the future. Has this itulip idea been given up?

Perhaps our dear leaders are smart and read EJs site among others. They know NG is a non-starter. Why fit out stations for NG when it is going to be as expensive as gasoline in a few years?

While EJ/iTulip, as well as myself, think a significant part of the shale natural gas 'revolution' is hype, at the same time it does not mean that there hasn't a significant increase in harvestable natural gas supply both now and until the medium term future.

Looking at the relative heating power:

Gasoline 1 gallon = 125,000 BTUs

Natural Gas 1 CCF = 100,015 BTUs (CCF=100 cubic feet)

Propane 1 gallon = 91,700 BTUs

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/2991047

Given that average gasoline prices are around $3.50 per gallon right now, and natural gas is $1.40 (residential) to $0.805 (commercial) vs. $0.42 (wellhead), the likely overreaction of natural gas prices to Wall Street hyping would have to reverse not just to pre-fracking prices, but twice that in order to even start approaching gasoline prices.

[jk]

Re: Odd solar power?

i think the proper comparator for ng isn't gasoline, it's coal.

[thriftyandboringinohio]

Re: Odd solar power?

Methanol is probably a better way to burn natural gas in a vehicle. It's liquid alcohol made from methane (natural gas). It burns just about as cleanly as natural gas in a converted gasoline engine. It can be handled, transported, stored and dispensed with the existing infrastructure for gasoline and diesel, and has a good energy density comparable to gasoline. It was a great performer in the early alternative fuel demonstrations but for some reason it seems to have faded from view. Methanol's big use is as an input to making formaldehyde (aka methaldehyde), used in turn to make adhesive for plywood and other polymer products.

I would have predicted the natural gas producers would prefer to build methanol plants and sell liquid fuel, rather than advocating gaseous fuel.
I was wrong about that.

[aaron]

Re: Odd solar power?

I was referring to oil. But, yes, you are right. It is not as significant I thought. We are at 1999 levels of consumption (not per capita); but, that is only about 5% from peak. Per capita ought to be a little bit higher than that since population has grown.

http://www.indexmundi.com/energy.asp...ph=consumption

[aaron]

Re: Odd solar power?

What is medium term? Long enough to build out the infrastructure? Or long enough to build it out for it to spectacularly fail when natgas trebles.

Our resident expert brought up an interesting point; Even if everything is a bubble, the shale gas wells are being built, powered by $fiat. Although the initial production decline is very steep, the wells may continue producing for a long time at smaller amounts. I suppose if production is greater than maintenance costs, then they will continue on; I do not know the numbers on those. My assumption is that the initial drillers will go out of business and the wells are basically free to the new owners.

[Ghent12]

Re: Odd solar power?

i think the proper comparator for ng isn't gasoline, it's coal.

Well that is probably a better comparison for what is. However, comparing NG to gasoline is a quick way to size up what could be. Natural Gas is really quite amazing in that it can play significant parts in both electricity generation and transportation energy consumption. Demand for it will only increase I think, so the real question I would ask is one of supply.


In my personal perspective, I have wanted to convert my 2009 Mustang GT to run on NG for a while, but I haven't had much success in or time for my individual feasibility research. Infrastructural inertia is not insurmountable, at least in my individual case, but that's about all I've been able to reliably find out.

[Thailandnotes]

Re: Odd solar power?

In Thailand the natural gas option for a new car costs the consumer 1500 to 2500 dollars. Conversions run 1300. The additional cost is easy recouped in fuel savings.

Honda City qualifies for 3000 dollar first time new car buyers rebate. Larger cars (Civic) do not. I have no idea how this public policy was arrived at.

[c1ue]

Re: Odd solar power?

Per capita ought to be a little bit higher than that since population has grown.

I believe per capita oil consumption has fallen, but it has been more than made up by other forms of (largely fossil fuel derived) energy. Per capita negates the effect of increasing population - increasing population generally relates only to overall consumption.

i think the proper comparator for ng isn't gasoline, it's coal.

If you mean in the primary traditional NG market - i.e. electricity and residential consumption, I would agree.

For transportation, however, I regard gasoline as the comparator. I cleave to NG, and particularly CNG as a far lower capital cost gasoline alternative. CTL can work but not without both pipeline AND CTL plant construction - even disregarding the large cost differences post-fracking - while CNG requires only (big grain of salt/*) public distribution. Or in other words, there are already NG pipelines out there, the buildout of these to the last mile is less than CTL plant plus CTL-liquid pipeline construction (which once built can avoid the last mile by using existing gasoline transport infrastructure).

What is medium term? Long enough to build out the infrastructure? Or long enough to build it out for it to spectacularly fail when natgas trebles.

Medium term: 10 to 50 years. Long enough for some coherent planning to build down the inherently transportation energy profligate American society/infrastructure. Of course a greater price increase is possible, but the US does have a lot of natural gas so personally I think this is unlikely to sustain even if it occurs.

Also the hype on Wall Street doesn't mean that an increase in supply isn't real. It just means it won't be as good as it seems. Even in the worst dotcom crap - the lies weren't generally about something completely false. The lies were about just how scalable/adoptable/marketable a given company's products were. Some, like Pets.com, were mostly lies. Others like Amazon were lies on scale but still a real benefit.

As for natural gas trebling - it would still be cheaper than gasoline. Because oil prices are going to be trending up in the meantime as well. A trebling of NG's prices today means parity with today's gasoline price.

In my personal perspective, I have wanted to convert my 2009 Mustang GT to run on NG for a while, but I haven't had much success in or time for my individual feasibility research. Infrastructural inertia is not insurmountable, at least in my individual case, but that's about all I've been able to reliably find out.

As ThailandNotes posted, the cost to convert - particularly older cars - isn't much. The ability to refuel, however, is.

I don't remember if I posted this before, but I friend of mine in Russia converted his Toyota? Isuzu? short bed truck to run on both NG and gasoline. The gasoline MPG is horrible - he thinks he can improve it - but the NG works great and is really cheap to fuel up. It works only because he lives near one of the handful of CNG fueling stations in St. Petersburg, and the gasoline is there for when he has to go too far out of range of said stations.

[Polish_Silver]

Re: Odd solar power?

In Thailand the natural gas option for a new car costs the consumer 1500 to 2500 dollars. Conversions run 1300. The additional cost is easy recouped in fuel savings.

Honda City qualifies for 3000 dollar first time new car buyers rebate. Larger cars (Civic) do not. I have no idea how this public policy was arrived at.

How common are the NG cars in Thailand, and were subsidies needed to convince gas stations
to add NG refueling?
What is the gasoline price in thailand? Guessing it is like $7/gallon.

[Thailandnotes]

Re: Odd solar power?

rough estimates...15 million vehicles, 1.3 run on NG. Most NG stations are new, selling only LPG or CNG.

gasoline is 4 dollars per gallon.

[thriftyandboringinohio]

Re: Odd solar power?

....In my personal perspective, I have wanted to convert my 2009 Mustang GT to run on NG for a while, but I haven't had much success in or time for my individual feasibility research. Infrastructural inertia is not insurmountable, at least in my individual case, but that's about all I've been able to reliably find out.

For one's own personal car, I'd start my search for a conversion here
http://www.impcoautomotive.com/index.php?pagename=home

and focus on conversion shops that use IMPCO parts.

I'd start looking at a home slow fill compressor here

http://www.cngnow.com/vehicles/refue...g-at-home.aspx

The whole thing will like cost more than it will pay back for several years, but it can be done.

[santafe2]

Re: Odd solar power?

We have struggled for years to try to explain to readers why oil is irreplaceable.

I completely disagree with this point of view. We are maybe 60 years into processing instantaneous solar power and we're now able to turn 20% of the short wave radiation sent to the earth by the sun into electrical energy. Oil is several orders of magnitude less efficient. That there has been a lot of this stuff available over the last 150 years offers up a false argument. If humanity is to survive in reasonable numbers, oil will not be the answer.