Air NZ and Biofuels

[Ian Warren]

QUOTE

the disposal of old toxic batteries
Food (or should that be fuel) for thought !! In little ole NZ I guess the only hope is lots more Hydro power or Nuke, neither of which are going to happen very fast.[/quote]
Nuclear Power , less waste for more power .. this the disposal of old toxic batteries .. people should look over their back fence , the grime and sludge , the rubbish and even general vandels (taggers , boy racers ) kill the clean green'New Zealand' yeah right ! and for that Mister Atom is the answer and should have been installed year ago ....

weres that can of TUI .

[Alex]

There's always the possibility of another thermal power station - they've worked well so far.

And reasonably safe and efficient - one of only a few places where they are viable in the world is in the central north island...

There's not a lot of valuable land between Rotorua and Taupo, mostly just scrubby (i.e. with scrub on it) farmland (with the Kaingaroa forest there - but they're cutting that down by the acre for farmland anyway) there...

Alex

[greaneyr]

QUOTE (deaneb @ Jun 9 2008, 05:50 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

And you would get all the electricity to power the cars how ??. I read that electric cars are not as big an energy saver as everybody thinks. The cost of production and use of batteries, not to mention the disposal of old toxic batteries may in fact use more fossil fuels than saved.
Food (or should that be fuel) for thought !! In little ole NZ I guess the only hope is lots more Hydro power or Nuke, neither of which are going to happen very fast.

Deane

Like I said, we'd need an electricity infrastructure that allows us to do such a thing before we could think about it. This is assuming PHEVs of course, and the bulk of hybrids on the road today don't plug into the grid at any stage.

As far as more energy used than saved, I've read those theories too but I dispute them. I can't see how having cars burn a fossil fuel to get 15% efficiency then waste kinetic energy going from 100KM/h down to zero km/h can be more efficient than a system that uses around 60-80% efficiency to the wheels and captures braking energy to charge a battery. Manufacture of hybrids may consume large energy resources now, but how old are they? Not very. It's naive to assume they won't hone the manufacturing techniques to use less energy. Remember economies of scale too. Hybrid production will only increase over time, which will mean the amount of resources needed to make one significantly reduce. Plus, if the manufacturing uses renewable power as much as possible... is that still counted as being a problem? Disposal may be an issue, but again it's based on today's technology where batteries have a finite life. Super capacitors or ultra capacitors aren't affected by this, as I understand it. Plus, newer battery technologies were already being released every couple of years. I'd imagine this is a priority area for worldwide R&D these days so we'll probably see an even greater rate of development now.

I also wonder whether those theories about inefficiency of hybrids aren't given more credibility by doomsdayers who want everyone to believe there is no answer and that the whole world is doomed. There is SO MUCH the world can do to reduce the problem of the price of oil just by becoming more energy efficient. Up until now, it hasn't made sense to invest any money in figuring out how to save energy since oil has been so cheap. I've been thinking about starting a wiki and online community site where people from different industries record what they have done/can do in order to reduce energy consumption in their field of work.

[Charl]

QUOTE (Ian Warren @ Jun 9 2008, 06:38 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Nuclear Power , less waste for more power .. this the disposal of old toxic batteries .. people should look over their back fence , the grime and sludge

Some wag pointed out the other day, that nuclear waste issues aside, uranium is even more of a diminishing resource than oil!
The fellow that invents a battery that really works, is going to clean up, BIG time.

QUOTE (greaneyr @ Jun 9 2008, 07:12 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Like I said, we'd need an electricity infrastructure that allows us to do such a thing before we could think about it.

There are small moves afoot, Genesis is about to run a test EV fleet.
I agree electricity has to be the way of distributing the energy, there are many ways of generating it.
Now if we could nationalise the generators again for say $1 (hey it worked for the railway track!) and get rid of all the bickering idiocy around the distribution lines, we could start with a holistic energy policy in NZ...

[SUBS17]

QUOTE (deaneb @ Jun 14 2008, 05:50 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

And you would get all the electricity to power the cars how ??. I read that electric cars are not as big an energy saver as everybody thinks. The cost of production and use of batteries, not to mention the disposal of old toxic batteries may in fact use more fossil fuels than saved.
Food (or should that be fuel) for thought !! In little ole NZ I guess the only hope is lots more Hydro power or Nuke, neither of which are going to happen very fast.

Deane

The batterys now days can out last the car and also they probably have better ones now the ideal system would be where they have a faster charging method to make them better for driving greater distances. The cars can just plug into a wall socket to charge up I don't think their consuption is that much although as it is NZs power supply does need improvements and its better if it were government owned since its become privatised the electricity charges has spiraled upwards yearly and the companies have done very little to increase production aside the odd wind turbine. Alot more could be done to reduce domestic use by adding solar panels and wind generators its possible to have far less electricity usage by doing this but its a thing that would require the government to carry out for it to work as solar panels and wind generators would need to be mass produced to bring the cost down. I wouldn't consider the nuclear option just yet as there are other methods that could be more effective such as wave generators etc.

[greaneyr]

Getting really OT here but I really don't understand why Nuclear keeps getting raised as an alternative to the world's current electricity requirements. At what point did Uranium stop having a finite supply and being subject to the very same rules of supply and demand and subject to the same exploitation as oil?

[SUBS17]

The reason why Nuclear power gets brought up in energy debates is because of NZs energy problems some people think that it would solve the problem I think it would cause more problems than be a solution and its quite a heavy risk if you have a meltdown it would turn NZ into a 3rd world country over night.

[Ian Warren]

QUOTE (SUBS17 @ Jun 14 2008, 03:04 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The reason why Nuclear power gets brought up in energy debates is because of NZs energy problems some people think that it would solve the problem I think it would cause more problems than be a solution and its quite a heavy risk if you have a meltdown it would turn NZ into a 3rd world country over night.

Nuclear Power .. hmm .. NZ is already a 3rd world country in some areas .. I'm happy to be a NUKEkea'a Tek person and Homer as my boss YIPPEE
Meltdown , smeltdown ... all the power we need .. tell me who pays there power at your home ... Damm Nelson Mutz ha ha

[SUBS17]

Well are you basing that assumption on any other 3rd world countries you've actually been too? I've been to a few 3rd world countries in the middle east, europe and Asia incomparison NZ is right up there as quite a high tech nation in fact its a fair bit ahead of alot of countries particularly with things like farming.