150 years of oil - a review and look ahead

Discussion in 'Science & Society' started by Billy T, Sep 1, 2009.

  1. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Samples below are from an excellent article.

    The prospects of a nuclear Middle East, with massive youth bulges, lurking social discontent and persistent oppression, holding the key to global mobility should be enough of an impetus to ensure that on its 200th anniversary oil be no more central to the world economy than salt is today.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 1, 2009
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  3. Carcano Valued Senior Member

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  5. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    We could build enough nuclear generators to power the world in a few decades, probably soon enough to prevent the current thinly-disguised petro-war from turning into WWIII. But we have to start, and there's too much popular resistance.

    Sure nuclear waste is an issue, but if we can phase those plants out in a couple of centuries and replace them with something cleaner, the volume of waste we will produce in that time will be manageable.

    The "something cleaner" is of course solar. As I have mentioned in several threads, the logistics were already worked out forty years ago with only 1960s technology to draw on.
    • We build our collectors in high orbit where we can make them as big as we want without covering the U.S. Sun Belt and a few other subtropical population centers with solar panels.
    • We beam the energy to earth in microwave form so broadly focused that we can safely graze livestock on the topsoil we placed on top of the microwave receivers.
    • And we've finally got the holy grail of "electricity that's too cheap to meter."
    The problem is that it will take quite a long time to build these collectors in space, not to mention international cooperation at a level that has never been achieved before. A pessimist would expect our descendants to dither around with nuclear power for several hundred years, until the nuclear waste actually becomes a problem, and perhaps a few terrorists have succeeded in creating another Chernobyl. Then maybe the human race will come together to solve its energy crisis.

    In the meantime, as the ancient Chinese curse goes: "May you live during interesting times."
     
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  7. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    The energy crisis will become critical long before we finish any new nuclear plants in the US. It will effect our ability to do even that.
     
  8. joepistole Deacon Blues Valued Senior Member

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    Yeah, or reliance on oil is just plain stupid. As Carcano mentioned, we have enough natural gas be self sufficient and a emit much less polution. Natural gas is the only reasonable bridge fuel. It requires no new technology. We jusit need to make it more available to the consumer.
     
  9. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    Natural gas is undergoing it's own peak. The faster we extract it, the faster it will be depleted. It's also expensive to transport.
     
  10. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    Not to mention people are simply afraid of it. A century later we're still haunted by the photos of San Francisco after the big earthquake: not destroyed by the quake itself but by the gas fires. There are a great many cities in America where it's not piped in. Absolutely nobody wants to ride in a car with a tank of the stuff strapped to the roof.
     
  11. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    No hard data, but I would guess ~1/2 of the taxi in Sao Paulo run on natural gas and ~10% of all stations offer it. (It is even cheaper than alcohol.) also it is not rare to see a city bus with notice on the side stating someting like "Running on clean natural gas to keep Sao Paulo cleaner." I would guess less than 5% of uses natural gas (called GVN, Gas Vehicular Natural, in portuguese, of course, so not sure it is exactly natural gas.)

    Many stoves used "bottled gas." - I think that is mainly butane. We had "gas" in the apartment for our stove via pipeline and about two years ago exactly what it was changed. That was about when Bolivia, under new elected Morales, approximately doubled the cost of the gas Brazil gets from them.* He also effectively confiscated some of PetroBras's production facilities in Bolivia. Brazilian ranchers in Bolivia, near the border were being forced out but Lula has gotten that at least suspened for a while (Lula, socially is quite left of center, but not in economics, so Morales and Lula get along despite this friction.)

    I went with wife to nice resort where she was part of a panel discussion (hotel in the mountains, all paid - we were picked up by their driver for at least an hour's highway speed drive to it from the airport. Car used natural gas and needed to stop for refill not far from hotel (at station driver normally used), but it had not stopped on the way to airport to get us. It must have gone more than 120 miles on the relatively small tank under the car. Until he stopped, I did not know we were running on natural gas even though I had helped put our bags in the trunk of the car.)
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    *I do not understand why, but there are no electric stoves in Brazil, yet most of the power ~80% is low cost to produce hydro power and Brazil does make a lot of alumimium. Must be some law, keeping the power for industry.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 5, 2009
  12. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    We have gas-powered buses in the USA too. Also some fleet vehicles. (Owned by corporations and operated by their employees.)
    "Natural gas" (at least in English) is primarily methane, the simplest molecule in the alkane series: methane-ethane-propane-butane etc. A methane molecule has one carbon atom and four hydrogen atoms. In the U.S. the other common gas fuel is propane--three carbon atoms with eight hydrogen atoms. It isn't piped, you have to have your own tank.
    Do you have a 240 volt transmission infrastructure? It's not practical to generate that much heat with a 120 volt source, too much transmission waste and the current is so high it requires enormous circuit breakers.
    That's British spelling. We spell it aluminum and pronounce it uh-LOO-mi-num. They say al-yoo-MIN-yum.
     
  13. kmguru Staff Member

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    Recent news: BP Discovers 3B Barrels of Oil in Gulf
    Methane Discovered Bubbling Up From Arctic Sea Floor

    India already discovered thick gas hydrate clusters (over 130 metres) in Krishna Godavari basin (the Bay of Bengal) and the deepest layer of such clusters (over 600 metres below the sea level), in the region of Andaman Islands. The current estimate of India’s offshore gas resources stands at some 200 trillion m3, including gas-hydrate deposits.

    Old news: we have a lot of Methane hydrates under the seabed....
     
  14. X-Man2 We're under no illusions. Registered Senior Member

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    Is these gases ok for the environment? I know little about propane and others natural gases.
     
  15. Syzygys As a mother, I am telling you Valued Senior Member

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    "Take the BP find in the Gulf of Mexico. Its drill hole is a staggering 10,685 metres deep – this is nearly two kilometres more than the height of Mount Everest. The well is also in deep water, which will make it much more expensive to construct a drilling platform and pipeline to shore."

    "Analysts were estimating last week that BP's cost of production from the Tiber field could be as high as $40 (Dh146.92) a barrel, which given that we have seen oil as low as $33 this year may not be very attractive to shareholders. Also, while there may be five billion barrels of oil in the field the chances of BP getting anywhere near that amount out of the ground is zero.

    Indeed, the company might be lucky to get five per cent to 15 per cent of the total, which would turn Tiber into a pretty mediocre find"
     
  16. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    In Brazil there is a mix of 220 & 110V 60Hz AC. There tends to be little 220 in the major cities. (I have never found any in Sao Paulo.)

    When living in the US with only 110V AC I never had anything but an electric stove for more than 40 years, so it is very practical with 110Volts. Probably true that the transformers are more numerous and closer to the homes than in a 220V system (or the "last mile" wires are larger).

    60 Amp main circuit breakers are quite common - that would allow each phase in 110 systems to draw 6,600W or as 110 is usually ~117 and two phases are available about 14Kw. more than OK for an electric stove and other appliances normally in use. Even a smart electric hot water, but mine were always gas. Homes were heated either gas or oil, although my last could be heated with wood in special fire place I designed* Most regular fireplaces that use room air for combustion produce a net cooling of the house. Mine could heat it.

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    *I used outside air for combustion, via pipe thru back wall of chimney and fireplace was sealed via glass doors except when loading new wood. That wood burned on, in front of, and below a square ~C shaped set of ~20 1.5 inch diameter, thick walled, boiler pipes -a unit I machined myself in the shop at APL. The straight pipe sections plugged into square cross section manifolds at all corners of the "square C" with snug, slight taper, fit - no solder vapors came into the room. Unit needed to be assembled in the fire place (so I could not weld it together at APL - it would have been about all I could lift also - designed to last ~100 years.).

    The air that was heated came up from the basement via square passage ways I cast into the concrete floor when house was under construction. The fan ramming air into my heat exchanger was in the basement ceiling. I cut wood from some land I owned.
     
  17. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    Are you talking about a regular electric "range"? I've never seen one designed to run on 110v. They make little countertop units with a tiny oven and two burners, but neither draws more than 1kw and you can't run them at the same. I've never seen a residential breaker box with a 110v circuit greater than 15a. All the big appliances--range, furnace, water heater, clothes dryer, air conditioner--are wired for 220.
    The civil engineers who plan urban infrastructure don't like household wiring to draw that much current because the heat it generates could be a fire hazard.
    In the last ten years in the USA there's been a major overhaul of wood-burning technology, building codes and attitudes. All new units are actually wood stoves dressed up to look like traditional fireplaces. They have complex carburetion and catalytic converters, so they're very energy-efficient and low-pollution. We have two in our 3000sqft house--one large fireplace insert and one small stand-alone unit--and they do a pretty good job of keeping it warm, with the help of ceiling fans. We only run our oil-burning furnace if it's a particularly cold morning and we don't feel like waiting for the slow warmup. The drawback of wood heat is that you can't hook it up to a timer.

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  18. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Yes – I was half asleep when posting but I did at least mention that there were two phases. You get 220 by connecting across them and ~117 from either to ground. So surely even thought all the wall outlets were 110, the stove would have been 220. Note the phases are 120degrees shifted so open circuit voltages are related by root of 3. I.e. if one is 220 the other is 127V but usually less as there is more line drop in the lower voltage with common ground return line also than just across the two phases of higher voltage.
    If stove is effectively surrounded by home interior, like the old pot-belly or "Franklin stoves" (one of Ben's inventions) but still uses the already warmed room air you can just about break even thermally but will dehumidify the house. This is because ~4 units of cold dry N2 and a little H2O must seep in under doors and window cracks (or somewhere) for each unit of O2 used in the combustion. - I.e. there is a mass flow up the chimney much greater than the wood mass burnt and usually a lot of unused or by-pass O2 going up the chimney too - sometimes a roaring and dangerous "chimney fire" does use that "by passed O2" in the flue gases. (Why one needs to clean the chimney if one burns high resin woods.)

    I did not know that catalytic unit for fireplaces were now available. Do they self clean? I.e. don’t get char coatings of tar-like resin on them?

    SUMMARY: Outside air for combustion is essential for good net heating of the house. Without it not only do you lower the humidity (which takes energy to restore) but also already heated air goes up the chimney and rooms not with the fireplace get cold outside air in thru the cracks for the flow up the chimney. Once I even built a sheet metal box I attached to the commercial Bryant gas furnace to stop it from taking air for the basement. An ordinary rain down spot pipe went thru a first floor wall dead space (there was a mildly curved stairs making that dead space.) to the attic to get the air it needed. Top of pipe had wire “squirrel nest guard” but to be safe there was also on my attached box a standard emergency flapper disk unit that would open to basement air if the pressure inside my box got more than slightly less than the basement air pressure. If you can – always provide outside air for the combustion inside your house.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 8, 2009
  19. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    But all our 110v outlets are in phase. There's nowhere I could go in this house where I could jumper across two outlets and get a Mickey Mouse version of 220v. And if I started fiddling around with the breaker box and somehow figured out a way to do it (without electrocuting myself), I would surely be breaking the law and invalidating my homeowner's insurance!
    As I noted, we use wood heat almost exclusively and it's been very economical. It has a good thermosiphon that scavenges the coolest air from the floor level, where it's constantly refreshed by seepage from outside. It doesn't get that cold where we live so we don't get compulsive about weatherproofing--rarely below 38F/3C on a winter night. But people live further inland at higher elevations where it gets very cold, and they're happy with their wood burners. As for dehumidification, that's a plus. The humidity out in the redwood forest is about 98% year-round... except during rainy weather when it gets really damp.
    We have our chimneys cleaned periodically but the stoves themselves haven't needed it. And the chimneys aren't really all that dirty either. The trick of course is to use the clean-burning wood. Ironically, even though we live in a place where firewood is a renewable resource and rather low-priced ($200 a cord delivered and stacked), it's even cheaper to buy the pressed-sawdust faux-logs in the supermarket that come out of the lumber mills that are one of our county's main industries. Those burn surprisingly clean and they put out a lot of heat.
    Wouldn't you asphyxiate yourself if you didn't?
     
  20. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    In your wall out lets there is a "Hot" and a cold wire which is about ground potential. If your plugs are with three contacts the round one it the ground - sort of a saftey. Years ago only two prongs were standard and there was no independent ground.

    I would be surprised if you have only one phase but it is certainly possible. Typically most homes have two and approximately half of the hot wall out lets are concected to one and half to the other. If the load is equal, then no current flows in the ground wire from the fuse box back to the power transformer, but of course all the current coming out of any wall outlets hot wire goes thru the load and back to the cold wire to the fuse box. the load is rarely that well balanced and the difference flows thru the cold wire back to the transformer. If you have 2 phases at the fuse box there should be two main circuit breakers - typically 50 or 60 amps each in a modern house. The voltage between them will be ~220V.

    In most locations it is illegal for you to wire up things, (unless you are a certified electrician). - Most even specify the color code for the hot and cold wires, but AFAIK*, there is no national standard for them (usually black and white wires, but in one district white may be hot,and another it may be black.) If there are only 15 or 20 Amp circuit breakers in your fuse box, then you may only have one phase service.

    Most strong electric motors (5HP or up) use at least two (many all three) phases. If you have only one you can sort of fake the second with a big capacitor.

    The apartment I live in has three phases but each unit get only two. I am sure the elevator motor must be three phase.

    We are way off topic so lets drop it - talk to a local electrician, but it is safe for you to see if you have only one or two larger circuit breakers in your fuse box.

    ------------------
    *That is 20 year old information. - I have been in Brazil for 18 yeras now.
     
  21. DRZion Theoretical Experimentalist Valued Senior Member

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    It may be that there is a whole lot more oil than we expected.
    http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/09/090910084259.htm
    It looks like oil and natural gas are not the products of fossil fuels but rather a geological process and it can be found in many more places than expected. I think that we will find cheaper and cleaner alternatives to oil, for instance solar and geothermal power.
     
  22. Billy T Use Sugar Cane Alcohol car Fuel Valued Senior Member

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    Thanks for your link, but I am not much impressed by older Russian men, like Vladimir Kutcherov, claiming support for the abiotic origin of oil, even if they have moved to Sweden and now have research institute connections.

    This is because under Stalin, science had to conform to the communist doctrine, which included the idea that man was destine to be perfected – freed his of his intrinsic greed and self interest to work for the good of all (the state). It was recognized that this would take a few generations and running out of oil was not consistent with this long range soviet plan for man. Likewise, crops could be perfected if given the correct cooperative farm environment – their genetic inheritance (good seeds) were not important. (That nearly starved Russia in a couple of years.)

    That said, I did find J.F. Kenney’s talk on NPR interesting. He is not old nor Russian, AFAIK, so does not have years of publications to defend. Hear it at:
    http://www.gasresources.net/Kenney-NPR.mp3

    Basically he claims that high pressure and temperature found in deep in the Earth’s upper layers can convert Fe2O3, H2O and carbonate rocks (marble etc) into oil, you can “drive your car home on,” which is probably not true even if your car is a diesel. He claims to have done this in the laboratory. I have no idea what the iron rust does, but at least he has hydrogen and Carbon from which oil could form.

    I would expect, as is the case normally and certainly if there is any truth to this, that many would try to replicate this abiotic production of oil. I have not heard on any independent confirmations. Thus, I tend to put him down as a modern “snake oil” promoter, especially after hearing his arrogant manner of speaking on NPR.


    BTW, I doubt your last sentece will be true until more than a decade into the future.
     
  23. DRZion Theoretical Experimentalist Valued Senior Member

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    Thank you for the link as well. When I read the article I had my doubts too. Where he claims that oil cannot seep 10.5 km down I don't know where he might get the numbers - the deepest borehole goes down 12 km; I doubt there are many that get even close to that deep. I am no geologist and I cannot really tell..

    Kenney is not the only one who believes this to be true- I have read many articles about study in this field. Coal and oil power is without a doubt partially geothermal. What these guys are arguing is that it may be PURELY abiotic.

    You may be surprised!
     

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