# RE: Not really fuel for our woodstoves . . . but fuel nonetheless



## firefighterjake (Oct 29, 2011)

http://bangordailynews.com/2011/10/...s-find-new-way-to-draw-fuel-from-trees-trash/


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## Danno77 (Oct 29, 2011)

I saw a short piece on tv about "straw board" a couple of years ago and have wondered since if it could be used for a different kind of biobrick. I know that's not what your link looks at, but it reminded me of that.


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## Duetech (Oct 29, 2011)

If it's that easy I need to make one and I could be burning my own fuel oil.


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## smokinj (Oct 29, 2011)

Pretty sweet! Simply always wins........


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## golfandwoodnut (Oct 29, 2011)

Right now they are finding so much Natural Gas in PA and surrounding states that it could easily get us off of foreign oil if the government and big oil companies would put a push on to convert cars to run off of it.  We have the Saudi Arabia of natural gas right here.  We have leased or land and I will not even know when they drill because the well will not be on my property since they can drill laterally now over a mile down.  I understand the wells produce for 30 to 40 years.

The ultimate answer is hydrogen, the most plentiful element in the universe.  It is everywhere, we have oceans full of it, and when you burn it, it turns back into water.  I cannot believe that no one has figured an inexpensive way to convert water into hydrogen.  Supposedly people have and some of them have been found dead.  You don't think the big oil companies would like us to put water in our tanks do you?


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## Danno77 (Oct 29, 2011)

The thing I like about burning wood is that it helps make me self sufficient. If there was a way that I could collect rainwater, grass clippings, twigs, leftover rice-a-roni, whatever, and dump that into my "as seen on TV" processor and then power my house, car, furnace, whatever, then I know we are on the right track. Right now it's the processing of these things into fuels that makes me shrug my shoulders. As long as I have to pay money for the processed fuels, then it's 6 of one half-dozen of the other.


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## CTYank (Oct 29, 2011)

GolfandWoodNut said:
			
		

> Right now they are finding so much Natural Gas in PA and surrounding states that it could easily get us off of foreign oil if the government and big oil companies would put a push on to convert cars to run off of it.  We have the Saudi Arabia of natural gas right here.  We have leased or land and I will not even know when they drill because the well will not be on my property since they can drill laterally now over a mile down.  I understand the wells produce for 30 to 40 years.
> 
> The ultimate answer is hydrogen, the most plentiful element in the universe.  It is everywhere, we have oceans full of it, and when you burn it, it turns back into water.  I cannot believe that no one has figured an inexpensive way to convert water into hydrogen.  Supposedly people have and some of them have been found dead.  You don't think the big oil companies would like us to put water in our tanks do you?



Not to rain on your parade, but ... 

"Fracking" to extract gas from Marcellus shale is not all that rosy. The chemicals that are forced into the shale at enormous pressure are a secret. Cheney & friends gave that away years back. There are now serious questions about gross overestimation of gas reserves in deep shales.

Hydrogen is NOT found in elemental or molecular H2 form. Being so reactive, it's found as molecules composed of many different subsances. Meaning, LOTS of energy will have to be input to extract the hydrogen. Water is the byproduct of burning H2 and O2. 
Hydrogen gas is extremely difficult to contain- molecule size of H2 is such that it will escape through extremely small brazing imperfections at tube joints.
Hydrogen is also extremely dangerous- concentrations ranging from 5-95% in air can be ignited. This fact really raised the pucker-factor of crew in diesel subs while charging batteries. (Nearing full charge, H2 evolution rate soared.)

Panaceas and conspiracy-theories are stuff for Popular Mechanics vice Scientific American.


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## blades (Oct 29, 2011)

Just think Hindenburg


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## golfandwoodnut (Oct 29, 2011)

They already have hydrogen cars, it is liquid form, not any more dangerous as other fuels as I understand.  My son is working in the gas business here and I can tell you it is booming business.  There are problems with extracting any fuel (as we know about oil spills),  my experience with gas wells is that once the well is drilled all you have is a few pipes coming out of the ground and they have been drilling wells for over 100 years.


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## billjustbill (Oct 30, 2011)

CTYank said:
			
		

> GolfandWoodNut said:
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With the right combination of technology and materials, all kinds of "fuel", and even processing their waste by-products (Wood Pellets from furniture manufacturing), can be made. 

Considering the need for cheaper fuels and power, Hydrogen has it potential, just like gases of  Propane and others.  The key is not to "write-off" its future just because the technology isn't ready.  With the advent of lightweight and strong carbon fiber storage tanks, progress is being made to even store compressed air for powering air motors....

Maybe a good example of technology and potential is Aluminum.  When Aluminum ore was discovered it was so expensive to process, it was worth more than gold; rich people had their wedding rings made from it.   When technology caught up with processing the abundance of the metal, and saw its expanding applications, today Aluminum's cost is so low, that even high quality scrap only sells for .71 cents a pound.  

How Hydrogen will be use, only Time and Technology will tell.


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## golfandwoodnut (Oct 31, 2011)

billjustbill said:
			
		

> CTYank said:
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Good comments Bill.  All we have to do is look at the Sun as a hydrogen power source that can burn for billions of years.  As I understand it every element came from Hydrogen and that is why it is the most abundant element.  As I understand it cars that can burn both Hyrdogen and gasoline are already in production and there is no loss of power with Hydrogen.  And enviromentally it does not have the waste products.  The whole key is having the oil companies build pumping stations for natural gas and hydrogen.  Exxon has already purchased a large natural gas company and they know it is the future as does Boone Pickens (he has a Green Gas Company and pushing hard for government acceptance by both parties).   

And as far as natural gas reserves being underestimated I find that absurd.  As I understand it, the reserves are like an iceberg.  The deeper they drill the more they find.  There is no need to go deeper now as they are finding abundunt supplies.  As I understand it everywhere they drill they are hitting natural gas around here.  Some is dryer than others, but even the wet gas can be used many ways in propane, butane, plastics, etc.


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## begreen (Oct 31, 2011)

GolfandWoodNut said:
			
		

> They already have hydrogen cars, it is liquid form, not any more dangerous as other fuels as I understand.  My son is working in the gas business here and I can tell you it is *booming business*.



Hmmm, maybe not the best choice of adjective in this context... but very funny none the less. :lol:


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## golfandwoodnut (Oct 31, 2011)

BeGreen said:
			
		

> GolfandWoodNut said:
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I thought the same when I wrote it,  Punny.


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## barwick11 (Nov 1, 2011)

Assuming the October 28th test went as well as everyone said it went, I prefer Nickel & Hydrogen fuel:
http://www.e-catworld.com/


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## mayhem (Nov 1, 2011)

GolfandWoodNut said:
			
		

> Right now they are finding so much Natural Gas in PA and surrounding states that it could easily get us off of foreign oil if the government and big oil companies would put a push on to convert cars to run off of it.  We have the Saudi Arabia of natural gas right here.  We have leased or land and I will not even know when they drill because the well will not be on my property since they can drill laterally now over a mile down.  I understand the wells produce for 30 to 40 years.
> 
> The ultimate answer is hydrogen, the most plentiful element in the universe.  It is everywhere, we have oceans full of it, and when you burn it, it turns back into water.  I cannot believe that no one has figured an inexpensive way to convert water into hydrogen.  Supposedly people have and some of them have been found dead.  You don't think the big oil companies would like us to put water in our tanks do you?



I once mathematically proved that you could solve all the world's energy problems with a simple generator attached to a treadmill pushed by a pair of porcupines and 6 tons of raisins.

But then unfortunately I found out porcupines are allergic to raisins.



The key issue with all that natural gas is the only way to extract it efficiently is by hydrofracking, and the granola crowd is dead set against it over drinking water aquafer concerns.  Ironically the only way to get my drinking water at my house was to drill a well down 440 feet and then hydrofrack it.

Hydrogen is a good solution for combustibles, the problem there is there is virtually no free hydrogen on earth.  You have to electrolize water to get it (as you noted).  The energy cost of splitting water apart, separating the two component elements and storing them usefully is too high right now.  Might be a good use for a windfarm or solar plant out in the middle of nowhere though.  Lots of companies have been running hydrogen powered car programs for quite some time now, BMW among them I beleive.  Thus far its been proven to be impractical from an infrastructure point of view.  The car's are easy enough I think...internal combustion is internal combustion, you have to design the fine moving parts around the fuel you're burning but its really relatively simple to do...the hard part is the infrastructure...it would have to be built essentially parallel to the gasoline infrastructure and both would need to be operated side by side for decades before the gasoline cars are sufficiently outnumbered by hydrogen.


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## Clarkbug (Nov 1, 2011)

blades said:
			
		

> Just think Hindenburg



Actually, the Hindenburg had a problem because it was painted with the equivalent of solid rocket fuel.  

I had to do some research on it back in the day, and the hydrogen bladders were coated in layers of a powdered aluminum mixture that is what goes into rockets today.  They threw down the landing ropes that got wet from the storm, and that was enough of a conductor to let some lighting strikes hit it, and then it was all over.  

There is the famous picture with the flames coming off of it, and those are reported to be from the diesel fuel that was dumped from the engines (the flames are heading downward, Hydrogen flames would be up near the bladder)

Obviously having a big bag of flammable gas didnt help matters, but that wasnt the main cause of its demise!


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## jharkin (Nov 1, 2011)

Shale Gas
The fracking issue gets discussed to death. I dont like it for three reasosn - #1 for the potential groundwater pollution #2 because it just keeps us on fossil fuels that much longer with the resulting GW potential and #3 because a lot of what I read says that frac wells run dry much faster than conventional  - a boom and bust.

Hydrogen.
If you are using hydrogen to burn in combustion  or in a fuel cell its basically a net zeroor even energy negative fuel. The reason is that as everyone points out it costs energy to separate it from water - in fact it takes an equal amount of energy to make hydrogen from water via electrolysis as you get back from powering a fuel cell to make electricity (remember - a fuel cell is electrolysis in reverse).

A hydrogen powered fuel cell is really just a battery without the recharge time issues.

Today, the only cheap way to get hydrogen is to manufacture it from natural gas. Which provides less net energy than just burning the NG.

When fusion is no longer "50 years away" then lets talk.



Sorry to be blunt, but people need to stop reading an editorial by a finance guy in the Wall Street Journal that is on the same page as a Texaco ad and assume that there is any scientific validity to it.


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## golfandwoodnut (Nov 1, 2011)

It is interesting to hear all the replies.  My view is that NG is a stepping stone, and one that is good for at least 100 years, and frankly I or none of us will be around past that.  There are lots of protests against it, but frankly farmers are getting way to rich to be against it.  I heard of 1 farmer who went from dirt poor to makeing $29,000 a day, and he can still farm!  That is hard to pass up.  I spoke to another farmer who has 2,000 acres.  He told me if he just leased 1,000 acres at $3,000 per acre finders fee, he would get $30 million before they drill and the big money comes in.  He said farming would just be for fun then.  By the way, I have city water so I have abosultely no fear of water problems.

There have been very few legitimate drinking water problems that I have heard about, they drill and frac way below the water table and they are not permitted to use creeks or other sources of water.  It has become big business to bring in waste water and dam up all water used in fracking.  I would much rather have this than foreign oil, and by the way, they are finding lots of oil doing this also.  I have heard just the opposite about fracked wells running out sooner.  I am hearing 30 to 40 years from Range Resources.

As said earlier there is already someone selling Hyrdogen energy plants, it is coming.  I agree infrastructue is the key unless someone makes it real easy.  I read where Honda bought the rights to a device you could hook up in your house that would make hydrogen, I am assuming from natural gas.  It would be nice to fill up your tank at home.  Hydrogen is the most plentiful element so I am sure someone will figure a method.  It burns clean also.


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## jimbom (Nov 1, 2011)

BeGreen said:
			
		

> GolfandWoodNut said:
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Saw a sign in a hydrogen generation facility - "If you are going to smoke, please wear a parachute."


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## jimbom (Nov 1, 2011)

GolfandWoodNut said:
			
		

> ...By the way, I have city water so I have abosultely no fear of water problems....



And where does the city water come from?

Don't get me wrong.  I am all for putting overseas energy out of business.  We are funding our own demise as a country by sending money to people who would cut our throats in an instant if they thought they would survive.  The sooner we use our own resources and talent to provide for ourselves the better.


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## Jack768 (Nov 2, 2011)

The anti-"fracking" nonsense is pretty much unsupported by the facts and is the work of people who are allergic to oil & gas.  These wells are way below -- like a mile below -- the water table.  Anti-fracking is a "save the underground rocks" movement.  We are the Saudi Arabia of natural gas and we should develop that resource.


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## golfandwoodnut (Nov 2, 2011)

JimboM the water supply comes from the township they don't seem worried.

I am with you LIJack, many people that are against this are jealous or just tree huggers that are against most anything (don't cut a tree down we will be out of them,  I can hardly see the sky where I live, I have more fear of trees falling on my house).  The gas is here and more than we can imagine, this is putting alot of people to work and could get us off of foreign oil. Hydrogen and renewal energy is the more distant future, but lets get off of foreign oil


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## jimbom (Nov 2, 2011)

GolfandWoodNut said:
			
		

> JimboM the water supply comes from the township they don't seem worried.
> 
> I am with you LIJack, many people that are against this are jealous or just tree huggers that are against most anything (don't cut a tree down we will be out of them,  I can hardly see the sky where I live, I have more fear of trees falling on my house).  The gas is here and more than we can imagine, this is putting alot of people to work and could get us off of foreign oil. Hydrogen and renewal energy is the more distant future, but lets get off of foreign oil



I agree with fracking and drilling for our own resources.  We are transferring wealth to people who will kill us in an instant given the chance.  Had it not been for Charles Martel at the Battle of Tours in 732, we would all be locked in a medieval  theocracy.  He stopped the first Islamic expansion into modern Europe and preserved the germs of modern civilization.  The second Islamic expansion is underway this century and we are funding it with oil money.

Drinking water in much of the country comes from deep wells.  Our municipal wells here in the Ozarks(1150' elevation) go down to sea level.  As you pass your fracking infrastructure and materials down through the aquifers and bring the gas up through the aquifers the potential for ruining those aquifers is there.  We are smart enough to do it correctly, but for-profit energy development needs to invest the money to insure it is done.  It is a cost of doing business and cannot be avoided.  There is some actual historical evidence that entrepreneurs looking to succeed in business will sacrifice clean water to make money.


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## dwillistein (Nov 2, 2011)

My dream is to own a wood-powered car.  Gives "warming up the car" a whole new meaning...


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## Jack768 (Nov 2, 2011)

FirewoodMan said:
			
		

> My dream is to own a wood-powered car.  Gives "warming up the car" a whole new meaning...



Would have to be a wood gasification unit, I imagine.


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## Dune (Nov 2, 2011)

FirewoodMan said:
			
		

> My dream is to own a wood-powered car.  Gives "warming up the car" a whole new meaning...



If that is truly your dream, make it a reality.

http://victorygasifier.com/

If you are wondering if it really works, the answer is yes.

My father ran his commercial fishing vessal on wood gas during WWII. They had to cut 30 bushels of wood into 3" cubes for every trip.


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## jharkin (Nov 2, 2011)

Statements like "the gas is more than we can imagine" and "more than 100 years" feel to me like opinions, quoted from pundits, usually with no scientific training, getting their information second hand, from sources that have a financial interest in making the public think the stuff is endless so it kills investment in alternatives. Maybe its true, but I'd rather see independent verified data than somebody "cause I said so 'son"

Alright then, assuming its for real - Even if there were a 1000 years of gas available, burning it all would turn this planet into Venus.  I wouldn't care to live there, nor do I wish to kick the can down the road so my kids have to live there.

Oh and groundwater? - as has been mentioned in many urbanized areas we are drilling deeper and deeper for groundwater because we are depleting the existing surface aquifers faster than they can replenish (look at the draining of lake Meade and the near universal water restrictions you see in many states).  Maybe contamination is not an issue now but it could become so, especially if we just through all the rules out the window.


I would * love* some cheap abundant source of Hydrogen. But unfortunately, contrary to "market will provide" theory, money cant change the laws of physics. Since fusion isn't practical yet and hydrogen has to be manufactured the first law of thermodynamics rules: you cant get any more energy out then you put into it. For example:
 -  If you use electricity to make hydrogen by electrolysis and then feed that hydrogen into a fuel cell, the electric output will be LESS than the electricity you put in.
-  If you chemically process natural gas into hydrogen and then burn the hydrogen you would get less BTU's than if you just burned the natural gas directly. 



My opinion - yes we should use that gas to get us off oil. But we should regulate and inspect CAREFULLY to make sure we don't ruin the environment, AND we should either tax the gas or the profits of the gas companies to subsidize alternative energy so that next step doesn't take as long as the first one has.


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## Dune (Nov 2, 2011)

jharkin said:
			
		

> Statements like "the gas is more than we can imagine" and "more than 100 years" feel to me like opinions, quoted from pundits, usually with no scientific training, getting their information second hand, from sources that have a financial interest in making the public think the stuff is endless so it kills investment in alternatives. Maybe its true, but I'd rather see independent verified data than somebody "cause I said so 'son"
> 
> Alright then, assuming its for real - Even if there were a 1000 years of gas available, burning it all would turn this planet into Venus.  I wouldn't care to live there, nor do I wish to kick the can down the road so my kids have to live there.
> 
> ...



plus one.


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## Jack768 (Nov 2, 2011)

jharkin said:
			
		

> Statements like "the gas is more than we can imagine" and "more than 100 years" feel to me like opinions, quoted from pundits, usually with no scientific training, getting their information second hand, from sources that have a financial interest in making the public think the stuff is endless so it kills investment in alternatives. Maybe its true, but I'd rather see independent verified data than somebody "cause I said so 'son"
> 
> Alright then, assuming its for real - Even if there were a 1000 years of gas available, burning it all would turn this planet into Venus.  I wouldn't care to live there, nor do I wish to kick the can down the road so my kids have to live there.
> 
> ...



Of course, there have to be regulatory controls.  There have been isolated instances of well contamination, but many activities lead to isolated instances of well contamination.  In general, fracking is a clean way to recover a clean fuel.  Also, it's important to look at what natural gas is displacing -- it displaces coal in electrical generation, it displaces oil in home heating and to some extent in transportation (CNG vehicles).  Almost invariably, natural gas replaces fuels that pollute more than natural gas.  Often, those fuels are also imported and cost more than natural gas, so the environmental and economic benefits are huge, suggesting that while appropriate regulation is needed, we should not take a hostile approach (such as the complete New York moratorium that Gov. Cuomo wisely lifted) designed to prevent responsible development.


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## barwick11 (Nov 3, 2011)

LIJack said:
			
		

> The anti-"fracking" nonsense is pretty much unsupported by the facts and is the work of people who are allergic to oil & gas.  These wells are way below -- like a mile below -- the water table.  Anti-fracking is a "save the underground rocks" movement.  We are the Saudi Arabia of natural gas and we should develop that resource.



Yup... pretty much sums it up.


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## barwick11 (Nov 3, 2011)

jharkin said:
			
		

> Statements like "the gas is more than we can imagine" and "more than 100 years" feel to me like opinions, quoted from pundits, usually with no scientific training, getting their information second hand, from sources that have a financial interest in making the public think the stuff is endless so it kills investment in alternatives. Maybe its true, but I'd rather see independent verified data than somebody "cause I said so 'son"
> 
> Alright then, assuming its for real - Even if there were a 1000 years of gas available, burning it all would turn this planet into Venus.  I wouldn't care to live there, nor do I wish to kick the can down the road so my kids have to live there.



Hey... who's the one stating opinions as if they were fact now?

There is zero scientific evidence for anthropogenic global warming.  Correlation != causation.

If it did, you understand that by burning wood, you're contributing to a massive influx of carbon emissions into the atmosphere.

Trust me, you're not hurting the earth by (cleanly) burning wood.

Oh, and none of you looked at my link back on page 1?  tsk tsk...

The dude is for real:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45153076/ns/technology_and_science-science/
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/11/02/andrea-rossi-italian-cold-fusion-plant/

I believe NASA has talked with him and confirmed that they also have been investigating a similar phenomenon.

And on another note, I'm actually putting together a venture capital proposal with a guy on a superconducting magnetic energy storage system utilizing a (very very very) high temperature superconductor.  In short, rapid recharging of an electric vehicle with zero heavy batteries, and vastly increased energy capacity over current batteries (like hundreds of miles).  Could render "foreign oil" a moot point.


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## jharkin (Nov 4, 2011)

There is tons of evidence that our climate is warming much faster in the last 100 years than in any earlier period not associated with some disaster like a supervolcano. There is no denying that arctic ice is receding at record levels and the great glaciers are receding everywhere. the photographic evidence is there... you can go to the Himalayas and see it first hand. I don't think anyone denies the climate is changing faster than natural cycles would predict.

At the same time we know that the only things that's really different in the last 100 years is FF. And its well understood that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. Is it the theory 100% conclusive?... no of course not. theories never are 100%  positive - the nature of a theory. But this is a case where there is an overwhelming amount of plausible eveidence and the consequences of doing nothing if its for real are so dire its not worth the risk.

If AGW isnt real and we reduce CO2 emissions anyway there  is absolutely NO downside to humanity other than making rich fat cats less rich and making the first world live with a little less luxury. If GW is for real and we don't do something about it the downsides could be disasterous for much of the worlds population.

Its easy for us to ignore the changes going on because our vast wealth as a nation insulates us from the reality. Go to north Africa where all those revolutions started over food prices, or Pakistan where 2 years of record floods have killed crop after crop, or Russia where the wildfires killed off the grain, or China where record droughts that have destroyed much of the rice harvest... I can go on but you get the idea.



Anyway .. at this point I know we are never going to agree so I'll drop it there. Surprised this hasn't been kicked to the can already.




Oh and BTW on the burning wood thing. Not all CO2 is created equal. CO2 from woodburning is coming out of the current carbon cycle. Plant a tree and it absorbs carbon, burn it and its releases, then its absorbed by the next tree. No net change in the carbon averaged over time.  CO2 from fossil fuels on the other hand is carbon thats been sequestered underground for 100 million years. When that was captured out of hte air it was a period in tie when the earth was so warm that there were tropical islands at the poles. If we put that CO2 back in the air the earth will return to that cliemate. Humans did not evolve to survive in such a world and we have no way to know if we could adapt to it (since our food chain is also dependent on the current climate).


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## Dune (Nov 4, 2011)

jharkin said:
			
		

> There is tons of evidence that our climate is warming much faster in the last 100 years than in any earlier period not associated with some disaster like a supervolcano. There is no denying that arctic ice is receding at record levels and the great glaciers are receding everywhere. the photographic evidence is there... you can go to the Himalayas and see it first hand. I don't think anyone denies the climate is changing faster than natural cycles would predict.
> 
> At the same time we know that the only things that's really different in the last 100 years is FF. And its well understood that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. Is it the theory 100% conclusive?... no of course not. theories never are 100%  positive - the nature of a theory. But this is a case where there is an overwhelming amount of plausible eveidence and the consequences of doing nothing if its for real are so dire its not worth the risk.
> 
> ...



Why bother?


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## macmaine (Nov 5, 2011)

Jeremy

1+

You don't have to travel to himalaya
To see Global weirding

Go to Vermont after Hurricane Irene
Go to New Jersey for a Halloween snowstorm
Go to Maine to see 60 count em 60 degree days in January

I like to think I am young but I have never seen the number and severity 
Of storms in my short 49 years

I wonder what evidence the anti evolution
Crowd at Fox needs to be convinced that 
Global Warming is not some academic ponZi scheme?
Melting of north and south pole?

Palm trees in New York?



Bottom line is by 2050 we have to be off
FF or it is over


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## barwick11 (Nov 7, 2011)

jharkin said:
			
		

> There is tons of evidence that our climate is warming much faster in the last 100 years than in any earlier period not associated with some disaster like a supervolcano. There is no denying that arctic ice is receding at record levels and the great glaciers are receding everywhere. the photographic evidence is there... you can go to the Himalayas and see it first hand. I don't think anyone denies the climate is changing faster than natural cycles would predict.
> 
> At the same time we know that the only things that's really different in the last 100 years is FF. And its well understood that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. Is it the theory 100% conclusive?... no of course not. theories never are 100%  positive - the nature of a theory. But this is a case where there is an overwhelming amount of plausible eveidence and the consequences of doing nothing if its for real are so dire its not worth the risk.



The warming effect of CO2 is vastly overshadowed by the warming effect of water vapor.  Not to mention cloud cover, solar activity, etc.  And there's actual evidence to show that CO2 levels trail temperature changes, they don't precede it.



			
				jharkin said:
			
		

> If AGW isnt real and we reduce CO2 emissions anyway there  is absolutely NO downside to humanity other than making rich fat cats less rich and making the first world live with a little less luxury. If GW is for real and we don't do something about it the downsides could be disasterous for much of the worlds population.



Why's it matter?  What's the harm?

Go visit the rest of the world where they don't have inexpensive power.  Ask them how they're doing.  Look at how people live in Africa, parts of Asia, etc, because they barely have enough money to buy a single lumber truck to haul lumber, and to build a sawmill to process that lumber into something useful.  Let alone the cost of the fuel and coal to power them.  Now you want to take away their only source of inexpensive power & replace it with an absurdly expensive source, all in the name of some theory put forth about how we're all going to burn up because of something that only accounts for 0.117% of the greenhouse effect?



			
				jharkin said:
			
		

> Its easy for us to ignore the changes going on because our vast wealth as a nation insulates us from the reality. Go to north Africa where all those revolutions started over food prices, or Pakistan where 2 years of record floods have killed crop after crop, or Russia where the wildfires killed off the grain, or China where record droughts that have destroyed much of the rice harvest... I can go on but you get the idea.



Wow, I didn't know scientists were so successful in predicting the weather that they could demonstrate that a slight increase in 0.117% of the greenhouse effect is causing record floods, wildfires, & droughts.

If it rains, it's caused by Global Warming.
If it doesn't rain, it's caused by Global Warming.
If it snows, it's caused by Global Warming.
If it's cold, it's caused by Global Warming.
If it's hot, it's caused by Global Warming.
If it's sunny, it's caused by Global Warming.
If it's cloudy, it's caused by Global Warming.
If its...


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## Adios Pantalones (Nov 7, 2011)

I wonder about the total energy balance in the process described in the OP.


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## barwick11 (Nov 7, 2011)

Adios Pantalones said:
			
		

> I wonder about the total energy balance in the process described in the OP.



I thought the same thing at one point:

Man-made CO2 accounts for roughly 3% of all *CO2* released into the atmosphere

Relate that to greenhouse effect now, where *all* CO2 accounts for roughly 3% of the greenhouse effect.

So we have 3% of 3% of the greenhouse effect being caused by man.  that's (roughly) 0.1%  Or 1/10th of 1%.  And believe you me, natural fluctuations in the amount of water vapor (not droplets), cloud cover, and all the other millions of effects on global temperatures, swing a whole lot more than 0.1% over the course of a year, let alone over the course of decades & centuries.

In short... No, we're not going to all die by 2050 if we don't get off fossil fuels.  Spend money on alternative sources of energy fine, but do it with your own funds, not mine.

And none of this takes into account the change in growth rates of plants based on the amount of available CO2, or other factors.


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## Adios Pantalones (Nov 7, 2011)

No, energy balance- not CO2 mass balance.   I mean the original post.  They use heat to transform a biomass into liquid fuel.  How much heat?

It often comes down to- it would make more sense to burn biomass directly, convert to heat or electricity, and use it that way.


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## barwick11 (Nov 7, 2011)

Adios Pantalones said:
			
		

> No, energy balance- not CO2 mass balance.   I mean the original post.  They use heat to transform a biomass into liquid fuel.  How much heat?
> 
> It often comes down to- it would make more sense to burn biomass directly, convert to heat or electricity, and use it that way.



Might be.  Heat --> Liquid fuel --> processing --> heat --> electricity

Seems a lot more inefficient than Heat --> electricity

Except when you're dealing with mobility issues.


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## jimbom (Nov 7, 2011)

barwick11 said:
			
		

> ...
> Wow, I didn't know scientists were so successful in predicting the weather that they could demonstrate that a slight increase in 0.117% of the greenhouse effect is causing record floods, wildfires, & droughts.
> 
> If it rains, it's caused by Global Warming.
> ...


+1  The rest of the list can be found here:

http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/warmlist.htm

A few years ago, I tested in direct tension a segment of a deep limestone core taken in Missouri.  The failure plane had a fossilized trilobite.  A few hundred million years ago, the planet was so warm and the oceans were so deep that the land near me in Missouri was under the sea.  My hands were the first human touch of the mineral impression of that creature.  The thrill was electric and I still remember every detail of the lab, the apparatus and the others present.  I always find it amusing when the warmist-alarmists wring their hands.  The earth preserves in many ways unimpeachable evidence that warming and cooling on a massive scale is part and parcel of our planet.  Geologic time.  How does that work?

But like Miss Manners admonished, we should never discuss politics, religion, or specific ladies in polite conversation.  Warmism is a religion like all the others, based on faith rather than fact.  My apologies for poor manners.


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## Dune (Nov 7, 2011)

JimboM said:
			
		

> barwick11 said:
> 
> 
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Your explanation disregards tectonic plate theory entirely.

-1


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## firefighterjake (Nov 7, 2011)

Soooo . . . how about that research about wood products being used as a fuel?


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## Dune (Nov 7, 2011)

firefighterjake said:
			
		

> Soooo . . . how about that research about wood products being used as a fuel?



That looks like a pretty massive breakthrough.

If the process could be run from waste heat, the efficieny question may be moot.

Clearly it needs to be capable of being scaled up, which remains to be seen.


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## jharkin (Nov 7, 2011)

I promised myself I was going to let this one go. I know we are just never going to see eye to eye. But yet I feel compelled to respond to misinformation.

Lets see....



			
				barwick11 said:
			
		

> The warming effect of CO2 is vastly overshadowed by the warming effect of water vapor.  Not to mention cloud cover, solar activity, etc.  And there's actual evidence to show that CO2 levels trail temperature changes, they don't precede it.



Ahh the water vapor argument. Made famous by Mr "junk science" himself Steve Milloy.  Except the part that never gets mentioned is that Milloy is on the payroll of Fox news, a number of large tobacco companies, Monsanto, and some of the oil majors. He is a paid lobbyist whose job it is to spread doubt on any science that threatens the profits of his corporate sponsors. He has denied everything from climate change to the fact that smoking causes lung cancer.  I wont even link it, go google it so you don't claim I made it up.

The reality is that its water vapor lags climate change, its NOT a forcing element. The amount of water vapor in the atmosphere is regulated by the total heat - more retained heat causes more evaporation. 




			
				barwick11 said:
			
		

> Go visit the rest of the world where they don't have inexpensive power.  Ask them how they're doing.  Look at how people live in Africa, parts of Asia, etc, because they barely have enough money to buy a single lumber truck to haul lumber, and to build a sawmill to process that lumber into something useful.  Let alone the cost of the fuel and coal to power them.  Now you want to take away their only source of inexpensive power & replace it with an absurdly expensive source, all in the name of some theory put forth about how we're all going to burn up because of something that only accounts for 0.117% of the greenhouse effect?




Based on this statement I'm going to guess you have never been to these places. I haven't hit Africa yet but I have been to China and India multiple times. I challenge you to go to Mumbai, or Dehli or Shanghai and take a big deep breath while gazing at the orange haze on a "sunny" day.  When you are done coughing try and explain to me why we should want to live in such an environment.




			
				barwick11 said:
			
		

> Wow, I didn't know scientists were so successful in predicting the weather that they could demonstrate that a slight increase in 0.117% of the greenhouse effect is causing record floods, wildfires, & droughts.
> 
> If it rains, it's caused by Global Warming.
> If it doesn't rain, it's caused by Global Warming.
> ...



Um no, we never said GW causes all these. Individual events are WEATHER.  When the frequency of record setting events increases dramatically in a short time that is a trend that does reflect on a shift in climate.




			
				barwick11 said:
			
		

> In short... No, we're not going to all die by 2050 if we don't get off fossil fuels.  Spend money on alternative sources of energy fine, but do it with your own funds, not mine.



Here is the thing, I know even palm trees at the north pole wont convince you, but what about resource depletion. Even with fracking technology we know there just wont be enough FF to support our current growth rates for decades to come. If you look at oil production curves, and REMOVE biofules oil output is basically flat or declining for over 5 years now - all while prices ran to the stratosphere.  FF production just wont be able to support our lifestyle at anything resembling cheap much longer .That kills growth and puts people out of jobs.




			
				JimboM said:
			
		

> A few hundred million years ago, the planet was so warm and the oceans were so deep that the land near me in Missouri was under the sea.
> ...
> The earth preserves in many ways unimpeachable evidence that warming and cooling on a massive scale is part and parcel of our planet.  Geologic time




Correct. There have been periods when the entire planet was tropical or covered in ice. Natural cycles cause these shifts over millions of years and animal life has time to adapt.  The problem is that using our technology we are forcing a 100 million year change magnitude within a few centuries. Life cant adapt that fast. That is the danger to our survival - whats so hard to understand?



We play god at our own peril.....


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## Adios Pantalones (Nov 7, 2011)

Dune said:
			
		

> firefighterjake said:
> 
> 
> 
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There are often caveats about "use solar to charge x" or "use waste heat..."- these involve large considerations of infrastructure that are probably difficult to put in place after a plant has been built (like retrofiting a heat pump).  It's interesting chemistry, to be sure.


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## jimbom (Nov 7, 2011)

jharkin said:
			
		

> ...The problem is that using our technology we are forcing a 100 million year change magnitude within a few centuries. Life cant adapt that fast. That is the danger to our survival - whats so hard to understand?.....



You can not have it both ways.  ie technology is causing rapid change but technology will not be used to adapt to that change.  Ye of little faith.  The same technology causing change, will be used to adapt to that change.  

Life adapts much more quickly in response to stress than generally believed.  Research is in the literature documenting isolated populations of plants and animals rapidly changing to fill available niches.  As I recall Darwin reported this.  He is still vilified for his observations.

Status quo is a state rarely found in nature.  It's adherents are found among men.  It is really very easy to understand.  

Climate is going to change.  We have to adapt.  Milankovitch hypothesis predicts the coming change is cooling.  There are questions about Milankovitch, but the theory was proposed before climate became political.  That and the good fit with historical data make me receptive.  So, get your stove ready.  We are going to need it in 10,000 years.  About the time Dennis will be burning this year's wood.


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## barwick11 (Nov 8, 2011)

Dune said:
			
		

> JimboM said:
> 
> 
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Which also is riddled with errors and inaccuracies, being based on a false presupposition about the age of the universe.  +1 again.


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## barwick11 (Nov 8, 2011)

jharkin said:
			
		

> Milloy is on the payroll of Fox news, a number of large tobacco companies, Monsanto, and some of the oil majors.



There's a good scientific argument...

Look, point is, I'm not all *that* worried about resource depletion.  Human beings have a remarkable ability to find new ways & methods of producing energy when they need to.

About 30 years ago, Jimmy Carter went on TV in his sweater and explained how in just a few years we're going to run out of Natural Gas, so we need to regulate its usage, etc, etc, etc...

So state legislatures across the country banned the sale of natural gas to businesses, because we needed to keep more of it to heat Grandma's house.  Tens of thousands of companies were put out of business virtually overnight, because we were supposedly all going to freeze due to a lack of natural gas.

We now know we have well over a 100 year supply of natural gas.

The list of "we're all going to die" scenarios is endless, and the damages (and lives) it's costed us is incalculable.


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## Adios Pantalones (Nov 8, 2011)

barwick11 said:
			
		

> Which also is riddled with errors and inaccuracies, being based on a false presupposition about the age of the universe.  +1 again.



Yeeaw- the urth is 6000 years old and the debil put dems fossils there in order to make um look oldur.  Yip.


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## Dune (Nov 8, 2011)

barwick11 said:
			
		

> Dune said:
> 
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Wait, you deny Global Warming and Tectonic Plate Movement?


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## Adios Pantalones (Nov 8, 2011)

And the death of Elvis


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## firefighterjake (Nov 8, 2011)

Heading to the Ash Can????


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## Adios Pantalones (Nov 8, 2011)

firefighterjake said:
			
		

> Heading to the Ash Can????



One can hope.  I think there were 3 posts on topic- something I was actually interested in


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## barwick11 (Nov 8, 2011)

Adios Pantalones said:
			
		

> barwick11 said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Do you really want to go there?  I've debated PhD geologists, professors that teach it for a living, on this topic.  They were at least cordial and able to hold an intelligent conversation on the topic though.  And I didn't say anything about "tectonic" plate movement, I said the theory.  Naming convention, etc...

Bah, you want to talk about the presupposition that the earth is billions of years old, and the fact that there's just as much *scientific* evidence for the other side of that debate, eMail me.  If you want to send this thread right into the ash can, keep talking about it here.


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## Dune (Nov 8, 2011)

Ain't nobody here as smart as dem guys, so you must be right.


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## Adios Pantalones (Nov 8, 2011)

LOL.  I'm not impressed with PhD credentials (since I gots em myself, and know plenty of dumb PhD's), and having debated this a dozen times- I've seen all the arguments.  "As much evidence" is... laughable.

too funny.  The interwebs- where fact is decided.


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## Adios Pantalones (Nov 8, 2011)

Dune said:
			
		

> Ain't nobody here as smart as dem guys, so you must be right.



Hey Dune- hold my beer- I's gonna commence evolvin...


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## Delta-T (Nov 8, 2011)

Adios Pantalones said:
			
		

> LOL.  I'm not impressed with PhD credentials (since I gots em myself, and know plenty of dumb PhD's), and having debated this a dozen times- I've seen all the arguments.  "As much evidence" is... laughable.
> 
> too funny.  The interwebs- where fact is decided.



you dare to challenge me?? the wizard (you become an official wizard by puting "Warlock" in front of your name, you can be a wizrd and a PhD if you like)?? I will draw power from the interweb nether regions to conjure something horrible to unleash upon you (the general you, not just you AP). WHen I say "Who's the master", you say "Sho Nuff". Let us all keep in mind that it was just a few hundred short years ago that daily temperatures started getting recorded....and few hundred short years (plus or minus a few thousand years) prior to that we had big chunks of ice covering things....and another distant human relative has been discovered acounting for some 1% of all the DNA in Asia. Lets not get so hung up on things that we forget to reassess things when new/more/better information presents itself.


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## Adios Pantalones (Nov 8, 2011)

Delta- I am confused, yet fascinated by your free association.  Have my baby.


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## Delta-T (Nov 8, 2011)

Adios Pantalones said:
			
		

> Delta- I am confused, yet fascinated by your free association.  Have my baby.



..ummm, YES, and I learnt it by reading Naked Lunch and Junkie.


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## Adios Pantalones (Nov 8, 2011)

There are complicating issues... like heterosexuality, we're both dudes, both married, and I been fixed- but we can work it out


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## Delta-T (Nov 8, 2011)

one need only have faith AP....I got some here, in a jar, we can share.


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## Dune (Nov 8, 2011)

Adios Pantalones said:
			
		

> Dune said:
> 
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What about a plant designed from the git.

Combined with an existing practice such as a chip fired electric plant, but designed from scratch.

I doubt a modern chip plant is more than 30-35% efficent, so size the distillation plant to the amount of heat that could be scavenged.


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## Delta-T (Nov 8, 2011)

i think its interesting that the whole energy debate usually falls back on inefficiency of "x". I dont think we'll ever really overcome that one. the dream of high efficiency cogeneration is a nice one to have, but I think its too much "magic bullet". I think, if we can develop a system that may be inefficient, but is low cost, and low impact (to the environment, to society, to the socio-political dialogue) that we can count that as a "win". I have high confidence that in the next decade or so we'll see PV materials become ubiquitous and integrated into everything (a win) and maybe the proliferation of small scale biogas plants. One of the really important steps IMO is the scaling down of power plants. More plants, smaller, driven by locally procured fuels (whatever they may be). I think the recent snow event and power outage here in the northeast is a great reminder that we need to have smarter grid technology along with more, and more diverse power solutions.


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## Dune (Nov 8, 2011)

Delta-T said:
			
		

> i think its interesting that the whole energy debate usually falls back on inefficiency of "x". I dont think we'll ever really overcome that one. the dream of high efficiency cogeneration is a nice one to have, but I think its too much "magic bullet". I think, if we can develop a system that may be inefficient, but is low cost, and low impact (to the environment, to society, to the socio-political dialogue) that we can count that as a "win". I have high confidence that in the next decade or so we'll see PV materials become ubiquitous and integrated into everything (a win) and maybe the proliferation of small scale biogas plants. One of the really important steps IMO is the scaling down of power plants. More plants, smaller, driven by locally procured fuels (whatever they may be). I think the recent snow event and power outage here in the northeast is a great reminder that we need to have smarter grid technology along with more, and more diverse power solutions.



Defintely.
There is the factor of viability too though, and efficiency plays a big role there.


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## jharkin (Nov 10, 2011)

barwick11 said:
			
		

> jharkin said:
> 
> 
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> ...




We have a fundamental difference in philosophy here. The idea that we (as a society) can just do whatever we please, consequences be dammed,  and our technology will always find a way to clean up the mess is a recipe for disaster IMHO. Its thinking like that that time and again has brought species to the brink of extinction, and then at the last second we call them protected  and expend heroic efforts to save whats left (think whales, buffalo, the bald eagle, etc). Or destroying our rain forest and wetlands then at the last minute place a few acres in a protected reserve hoping to save it. Or the declining honey bee populations that nobody knows the cause of? Or the new super bacteria (MRSA, NDM-1, etc) that antibiotic research cant keep up with? And on and on.

What happens when the old investing mantra "past results are no guarantee of future performance" kicks in in the natural world and we stumble into some problem we cant come up with some last minute miracle techno fix for?  Wouldn't it make sense to try and, just once, actually attempt to prevent a mess before it happens rather than reacting to it after the fact?

Also, this "100 years of natural gas" claim is interesting. Ive see the figures that estimate the shale resources at close to 2000 TCF, vs. US consumption of around 20 tcF a year. Those proclamations say "look we have a 100 years worth!"  Right after that they mention that at 2-3% a year growth or more our consumption will double by 2035 and keep going up form there. Suddenly 100 years becomes 50 or less.  

We all know the timescales that it takes to make a wholesale shift in our energy infrastructure. If its going to be mostly gone in 50 years or less we really need to be building the replacement TODAY to have a chance at a smooth transition.  Our children will be around to witness the day there is nothing left, its really not much time at all when viewed against how long people have lived on this rock.


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## Frozen Canuck (Nov 10, 2011)

Can't help but wonder if we had proceeded with at least some of the ideas for getting off of foreign oil that your Pres Carter had begun to propose - where would we be now? 

As it stands, all we have done is kick the can down the road 50 years or so & we are discussing the same issues. Not much progress at all in getting off foreign oil given those 50 years.

Maybe George Carlin had it right & our species is screwed, as we just can't seem to get past that greed/self interest thing, no matter how hard some try.


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## Redskins82 (Dec 14, 2011)

I'd bet that 100 years of gas is like nuclear fission generated electricity being too cheap to meter. Iraq had weapons of mass destruction too. 

Shill!


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