The Energy Blog

Plug-in hybrids are bettah!

Felix Kramer just posted a new blog:

CalCars launches BETTAH 90-Second Flash Online Movie Summary: We're happy to announce the launch of BETTAH, an animation that shouts to the world: "Hybrids are good, but plug-in hybrids are bettah!"

Watch the movie and sign the petition! (press the "Demand Plug-In Hybrid" button below movie)

CalCars launches BETTAH 90-Second Flash Online Movie

PEM Fuel Cell Membranes

The hydrogen fuel cell electrolyte or more commonly the polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) is a material that looks something like ordinary kitchen plastic wrap.  It conducts only positively charged ions and blocks the electrons. The PEM is the key to the fuel cell technology; it must permit only the necessary ions to pass between the anode and cathode. Other substances passing through the electrolyte would disrupt the chemical reaction.

Three major characteristics of membranes are not totally satisfied by today's membranes when applied to a hydrogen automotive fuel cell.

1. The demand for continuous peak power in hot ambient environments,
2. Cold start capability
3. Stable performance at low relative humidity

DOE has set 2010 technical goals of conductivity of 0.1 Ohms-cm² @ 160 C, oxygen and hydrogen crossover of 2 mA/cm² or less, cost of $5.00/kW and durability of greater than 5,000 hours for transportation applications and 40,000 hours for stationary applications.

Dynamotive Sells Plants in Ukraine

DynaMotive Energy Systems Corporation (OTCBB: DYMTF.OB) announced that it has licensed a 200 tpd pyrolysis plant with an option for two further plants of similar size to Rika Ltd, Latvia.

The pants will use patented technology that can convert forest and agricultural wastes such as bark, sawdust and sugar cane bagasse into a liquid fuel. Unlike fossil fuels, BioOil is renewable, clean burning, low in emissions and is greenhouse gas neutral. It can be used as a clean fuel for power generation in gas turbines, diesel engines and boilers. The West Lorne Facility, the first BioOil cogeneration plant that was built has provided the demonstration platform for the commercialization of the technology.

The plant will be located at one of Rika’s farm operations in the Ukraine which covers 8,700 hectares of land. The farm would be capable of supporting the three plants envisaged under the licensing agreement. Under the Agreement, Rika has the option to order two further plants and will be guaranteed fabrication slots in 2007 if such option is exercised within 12 months of the signature date.

More Information about Dynamotive and its process can be found here.

Technorati tags: biofuels, pyrolysis, bio-oil, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: Dynamotive Sells Plants in Ukraine

Hydrogen Engine Center Unveils Mini Oxx Three Cylinder 2.4L Engine

Hydrogen Engine Center (HEC) (OTC BB: HYEG.OB) today unveiled the new Mini Oxx(TM) three cylinder 2.4L engine at Aviation Industry Expo in Las Vegas, Nev. The Mini Oxx(TM) is a compact version of HEC's Oxx Power(TM) six cylinder 4.9L engine. The Mini Oxx(TM) will produce approximately 65 horsepower. Many applications exist for the Mini Oxx(TM) including luggage tractors and other airport ground support equipment.

"Seventy-two of the 81 parts used in the six cylinder, 4.9L engine are the same for the new three cylinder Mini Oxx(TM) and are interchangeable," said Ted Hollinger, president of HEC.  The engines include the same essential technologies and can be converted to use hydrogen when it is available. HEC has targeted production of the Mini Oxx(TM) to begin in the first quarter of 2007.

Hydrogen Engine Center (HEC) engineers, manufactures and sells a family of low-emission industrial engines and generator sets built to run on gasoline and a variety of other alternative fuels, including hydrogen. HEC is located at 2502 East Poplar Street, Algona, IA 50511. Visit http://www.hydrogenenginecenter.com/ for more information

Widespread Interest Shown in Bid to Host FutureGen Project

The FutureGen Industrial Alliance reported today that offerors in nine states (totaling 22 sites) have expressed an interest in hosting the FutureGen Project -- the world's first coal-fueled "zero emissions" power plant that will generate electricity and hydrogen while capturing and permanently storing carbon dioxide deep underground.  FutureGen has an aggressive schedule to site the plant and begin construction within three years.

The FutureGen Alliance is a coalition whose members include some of the world's largest coal companies and electric utilities including: American Electric Power; Anglo American; BHP Billiton; the China Huaneng Group; CONSOL Energy Inc., Foundation Coal; Kennecott Energy, a member of the Rio Tinto group; Peabody Energy; and Southern Company. These companies provide energy to tens of millions of U.S. and international residential, business, and industrial customers in Asia, Australia, Canada, Continental Europe, the People's Republic of China, South Africa and the United States, among other regions.

Thin Film and Organic PV Market to Reach $2.3 Billion in 2011

According to a newly released report from NanoMarkets, an industry analyst firm, the market for thin film and organic photovoltaics (PV) will be worth over US$2.3 billion in the year 2011 and $3.3 billion in 2013. This is the most optimistic forecast for thin film solar PV that I have seen and is good new for thin film producers.  According to the press release:

The report examines key product sectors that will create revenue opportunities over the next several years. Integrated building and construction products (BIPV) such as PV-enabled roofing and window materials are projected to be the largest market opportunity measuring $800 million ($US) in 2011 with large project and consumer electronic products the second and third largest market opportunities. On the materials front, amorphous silicon, the best established of the various thin-film PV materials, will represent an $800 million ($US) opportunity followed by organic and hybrid organic/inorganic materials and then CIS/CIGS.

In other information I obtained from NanoMarkets, BIPV retains its market share in 2013, but large projects increase their market share slightly at the expense of other markets. The potentially lowest cost cells (probably as claimed by the companies) were for dye cells followed by CdTe cells.

Ethanol Crunch

If you haven't noticed in the press, It is widely believed that the use of ethanol to replace MBTE in gasoline will cause the price of gasoline to increase this summer.  US produced ethanol is unlikely to be sufficient to meet demand.  Imports of more ethanol from Brazil will be required, which is made more expensive by a tariff on imports.  What I don't understand is the timing of all the publicity regarding more ethanol pumps at gas stations and for flex fueled vehicles, when we are facing a shortage of ethanol.  A Reuters article gives some of the background on the ethanol shortage.

Technorati tags: ethanol, MBTE, energy, technology

The Nuclear Waste Disposal Debate

EnergyBiz recently had a couple of articles exploring the issues relating to the implementation of nuclear waste disposal technology. The first article, written by three scientists, presented the case for using fast reactors.

Currently the United States has no effective strategy for dealing with used nuclear fuel. Plans for disposing of it at Nevada's Yucca Mountain continues to raise doubts as to whether it might pose safety problems some time in the future. Recycling the fuel is considered a better route by some. It would reduce the waste to a much more manageable size and insure that we have fuel for our nuclear power.

President Bush is asking congress to revive research into the use of fast reactors to address the nuclear waste problem. A conventional 1,000 megawatt reactor produces 100 tons of spent fuel a year that still contains 95 percent of its energy and that must be stored up to 10,000 years. A fast reactor of the same size would generate about a ton of fission products that would have to be stored for about 500 years.  The Department of Energy estimates it may cost $13 billion over a decade to develop a fast-reactor and reprocessing capability.

Wind Energy Costs Dropping Below Conventional Sources

The cost of wind-generated electricity for consumers is now less that of electricity from conventional sources in some markets. An article from the Earth Policy Institute gives an interesting insight about the inroads that wind energy is making into our energy infrastructure.

When Austin Energy, the publicly owned utility in Austin, Texas, launched its GreenChoice program in 2000, customers opting for green electricity paid a premium. During the fall of 2005, climbing natural gas prices pulled conventional electricity costs above those of wind-generated electricity, the source of most green power. This crossing of the cost lines in Austin and several other communities is a milestone in the U.S. shift to a renewable energy economy.

Overall, U.S. wind-generating capacity expanded by 36 percent in 2005, reaching 9,149 megawatts. This year it could expand by 50 percent. At the end of 2005, there were commercial wind farms in 30 states. (Data at can be found here.)

Wind power generation would grow even faster if it were not constrained by the availability of turbines. General Electric, now supplying 60 percent of the U.S. wind turbine market, is sold out through 2007. Clipper Windpower, a startup turbine manufacturer, is planning to produce 20 of its 2.5-megawatt Liberty turbines per month by mid 2006 and a total of 250 turbines in 2007. Its production is also committed well into the future.

Rocketdyne Plug Flow Gasifier

The Rocketdyne plug flow gasifier (RPFG) (also referred to by DOE as compact gasifier) is a single stage plug flow entrained flow slagging gasifier, with dry coal feed, short residence time, and quench. The gasifier also features a rapid mix multi-port feed injector and actively cooled walls.  These features are claimed to result in lower capital cost, higher efficiency, greater durability, higher availability, ability to handle low rank coal/lignite and better carbon conversion all resulting in a lower cost of electricity in associated IGCC plants. 

This combination of features potentially overcomes most of the drawbacks of current commercial gasifiers. In a EPRI presentation they stated: "with further enhancements, e.g. Jacobs desaturator, this could be the best gasifier for CO2 capture." The gasifier is in early development with pilot plant tests not scheduled for 2007. 

This gasifier is an advanced gasifier being developed by DOE that promises higher efficiencies and lower capital cost than present gasifers as well as excellent carbon capture.  If development goes as planned the technology will have been demonstrated on a pilot scale by 2010.

Requirements for the gasifier include operation 1000 psig or more at 2600 F and in the presence of corrosive H2S gas and slag. The high heating rates of this gasifier make possible very short gasification residence times, increased thermal efficiency and carbon conversions approaching 100 percent. Another result of the high heating rates is that the reactor is one-tenth the size of an equivalent conventional gasifier, reducing capital costs.

A sign of the Times?

Westinghouse scouting Pittsburgh area to expand nuclear operation
Westinghouse Electric Co. is scouting western Pennsylvania for an expansion site where it would hire more than 1,000 workers to meet rising demand for its nuclear power reactors, company officials said.

Solar Energy’s Bright Future

A very rosy picture is painted for the solar industry in this article in Red Herring. A good read.  Some short excerpts:

During the last year, solar power got more buzz with each oil and natural gas spike ... Some solar stocks doubled in just the last three months ... The worldwide solar market grew from $8.3 billion in 2004 to more than $12 billion in 2005 ... expects the market to top $16 billion this year and $40 billion in 2010 ... That still leaves a peanut-sized industry compared to fossil fuel—a trillion-dollar-plus market ... It’s not a matter of if solar will play a big part in electricity generation, but when. ... That’s one reason why plenty of venture capitalists are happy to bet on these companies. Energy is one of the greatest problems facing the world ... Peak times, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., roughly correspond to when the sun shines. In some parts of California, solar prices now match peak power prices, even when incentives are excluded.

Technorati tags: solar, solar power, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: Solar Energy’s Bright Future

Silcon Supplies Determine Timing of Major Solar Cell Production Facility

Motech Industries, the largest maker of solar cells in Taiwan and the ninth in the world in 2005, plans to expand its annual production capacity to 1GWp (gigawatts-peak) to rank among the top-three global makers, said company CEO Simon Tsuo.

The expansion of production, however, will be influenced by the global supply of polycrystalline silicon, the key material for making solar cells, said Tsuo. The global supply is currently at least 20% short of demand and the shortage will persist until 2008-2009, Tsuo noted. Motech has secured material supply for 120MWp (megawatts-peak) output this year but is not sure about the available supply in 2007, Tsuo said.

So they will expand to 1GWp at some indefinite time when enough silicon is available.  This announcement points out the severity of the silicon shortage. Timing of the availability of silicon is more pessimistic than I have seen in other reports.

Technorati tags: solar, solar power, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: Silcon Supplies Determine Timing of Major Solar Cell Production Facility

Altairnano's Lithium-Ion Car

Today's edition of MIT's Technology Review has an interesting article "The Lithium Ion Car", that features a test car that AltairNano plans to build.  The article gives the background on why lithium-ion batteries are so great. Nothing especially new to regular readers, but a nice write up extolling the advantages of next generation lithium-ion batteries.  Green Car Congress had a recent post announcing an agreement that Altair and Boshart Engineering entered into to develop this car.

Technorati tags: batteries, vehicles, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: Altairnano's Lithium-Ion Car

First Anniversary of The Energy Blog

On the first anniversary of The Energy Blog I thought it would be appropriate to share some of my thoughts on where we stand in The Energy Revolution, where we are headed and some of the things that I have learned during the past year.

My initial interest in starting the blog was that I was concerned that the price of oil was increasing because of a shortage of oil. I wanted to learn more about it.  I soon became interested in the peak oil phenomena and was immediately sold on the idea that there was a finite amount of oil and that we were approaching the period of peak oil.  What took me quite a bit of time to get through my thick skull was that the term peak oil was used rather loosely and misleading conclusions were being reached by many.  What I have concluded is that we have passed the peak production of cheap,  easy to produce conventional oil and we are now entering an era where oil is going to be increasingly more expensive.  We have vast amounts of oil reserves in what is called sour oil, heavy oil, oilsands oil and shale oil.  The quantity of conventional sweet conventional oil is declining, but is being replaced by the more costly oil at a rate that is keeping up with demand.  Shale oil is still uneconomical and it will remain so for several decades, assuming no technological breakthrough in production costs.

Solar Powered UAV

QinetiQ, Europe's largest science and technology organization, has completed the first flight trials of Zephyr - a High-Altitude, Long-Endurance Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) that has a 12 meter (39 ft) wingspan but weighs just 27 kilograms (59 pounds).

The trials took place at the White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico, USA. Two aircraft were flown for four and a half and six hours respectively, the maximum flight times permitted under range restrictions. The maximum altitude attained was 27,000 feet above sea level.

Coal: America's Energy Future

WASHINGTON, March 22 /PRNewswire/ -- The National Coal Council (NCC) today released "Coal: America's Energy Future," a study that contains recommendations to the U.S. Secretary of Energy to maximize use of abundant coal for clean electricity generation, transportation fuels, natural gas, hydrogen and ethanol over the next 20 years.

The study recommends the additional use of coal to reduce U.S. energy costs 33 percent while creating more than 1 million new American jobs per year and an aggregate gain of more than $3 trillion in gross domestic product (GDP), which increases to $4 trillion with enhanced oil recovery.

The study identifies ample amounts of U.S. coal reserves to support 100 gigawatts of new electricity generation, 2.6 million barrels per day of refined liquid products, and 4 trillion cubic feet (TCF) per year of natural gas production for all applications, in addition to support for ethanol, enhanced recovery of oil and coalbed methane, and hydrogen production. ...

Thermal Solar Power Booming in Spain

The Spanish thermal solar power race is on. In Spain, a company called Solucar has a 11 MW solar tower power project under construction, two more 20 MW towers being financed and permitted and 300 MW of parabolic trough plants under development.  ACS Cobra has three 50 MW of parabolic trough plants due to start construction soon. In addition Spain's largest utility, Iberdrola, has announced that it has ten parabolic trough trough projects totaling 500 MW underdevelopment. An array of smaller projects brings Spain's total pipeline of solar projects to near 1,000 MW. 

All this activity results from a 2004 ministerial ruling, Royal Decree 436, which "establishes two alternative payment schemes, both guaranteed over the 25 year life-cycle of thermal solar plants, and diminishing thereafter. The first is a fixed, guaranteed payment of 300% of the Average Reference Tariff (ART) for electricity. The second induces operators to compete on the national wholesale electricity market. Here, CSP generation receives 250% of the ART plus a 10% additional incentive."  This is further explained in the referenced article.

The solar tower technology involves a high central tower, around which a series of reflectors, or heliostats, are situated in concentric arcs at ground level. The heliostats track the sun's position and concentrate radiation on a thermal receiver, mounted at the top of the tower. The heat, at a temperature in excess of 1100 ºF (600ºC), is used to generate the steam that drives the turbine.

Hydrogen or Batteries by 2020?

According to a Reuters report on last weeks National Hydrogen Association annual conference at the Long Beach Convention Center:

Hydrogen fuel proponents see 2020 as the year it all comes together.

Not only will there be affordable zero-emissions hydrogen-fueled cars in every showroom but in 2020 a smattering of houses across the world will be lighted with electricity from hydrogen-powered home generators.

Even proponents agree there are four major hurdles researchers need to solve before the fuel can be used widely: storage, fuel cell durability, affordability and a delivery system.

That is good news to me.  By that time plug-in cars and EV's should have been available in production quantities for eight years or so and the need for fuel cell vehicles should have gone away.  Both methods are very dependent on electricity to produce the "juice" (hydrogen or electricity) that goes into cars. The overall efficiency of an electric car is more than twice that of a hydrogen car eliminating the need to build many billions of dollars worth of generating plants and conserving our coal or nuclear resources for many years.  This will give us more time to ramp up our renewable energy sources so that by say 2050 we may able to get most of our energy from wind, solar, and ocean power and should have enough bio-liquids for producing biochemicals and to fuel the remaining vehicles that have not been converted to electric power.  There will be some expensive oil and natural gas available, but hopefully we will not have to use it for vehicles or to make electricity. Fuel cells may have some very good applications for stationary power in CHP applications where 85% of the energy in the fuel can be used. The transition to heating all buildings with either the waste heat from fuel cells or mass use of geothermal heat pumps will be well underway, eventually eliminating the need for fossil fuels for building heat.  Hopefully there will be some exotic way of producing hydrogen, such as from some mircrorganism, so that we don't have to use biofuels or electricity to make the hydrogen.

Technorati tags: hydrogen, fuel cells, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: Post title

PHA Plant Will Produce Renewable, Biodegradable Plastics From Corn

An example of how we can reduce our dependence on oil, by making plastics in cojunction with ethanol production.

Archer Daniels Midland Company (NYSE:ADM) and Metabolix have selected Clinton, Iowa as the location for the first commercial plant that will produce PHA, a renewable, biodegradable plastic from corn. This plant will have an initial annual capacity of 50,000 tons per year.

The plant will produce PHA natural plastics that have a wide variety of applications in products currently made from petrochemical plastics, including coated paper, film, and molded goods. The PHA natural plastics are produced using a fully biological fermentation process that converts agricultural raw materials, such as corn sugar, into a versatile range of plastics that have excellent durability in use, but are compostable in both hot and cold compost, and are biodegraded even in the marine environment.

Scientific American Plugs Plug-ins

The advantages of plug-in hybrids are probably quite familiar to most of the readers of The Energy Blog, but this article, via Felix Kramer of CalCars, is especially well written. I especially like their comments in the next to last paragraph where they conclude that the efficiency of a plug-in is much higher than that of fuel cell car.  If you want to read more than is below, you will have to fork over $4.95 at your local newstand. Felix nothing but praise for this article that is appearing in the current issue of Scientific American saying:

"Anything that goes into this 161-year-old magazine is exhaustively examined and 'vetted.'  Thus, it's a major signal that hybrid cars have arrived when an article called "Hybrid Vehicles Gain Traction" appears on pages 72-79 of the April 2006 issue (now on new-stands). That's also true for plug-in hybrids when the cover promotes the article with the phrase 'Plugged-In Hybrid Cars.' This article provides a superb overview of hybrid technology, Then it positions PHEVs as the logical outcome of the evolution of advanced technology vehicles, and explains their benefits. We present a few excerpts below."

By then [2010], next generation technology, called plug-in hybrids will offer motorists still better fuel efficiency as well as other perks: low-cost battery recharging overnight by simply connecting a 120-volt plug to an electrical outlet at home or work, very few trips to the gas station each year, and even the chance to sell surplus power back to the electric grid. Beyond the consumer benefits, however, the new plug-ins would help reduce the release of greenhouse gases by displacing emissions from millions of tailpipes to utility power plants. Today these facilities burn domestically supplied coal or natural gas, and in the future they should generate cleaner electricity from energy sources such as wind, solar or even advanced fossil-fuel systems that capture carbon dioxide for underground storage.

Solar Energy from Space

The following press release reports on an article that appeared in the March issue of Time Warner's Business 2.0 magazine that included plans for Space Island Group (SIG) to supply energy from space to any point on earth beginning in the next decade.  According to SIG's website, "... solar satellites (will be) launched, assembled and operated cheaply enough to profitably sell their power for ten cents per kilowatt-hour. Conversion of 90% of Earth’s power needs to solar power generators could be completed by 2050, giving companies and employees several decades to adjust to this new technology."  This company has the appearance of a very serious company committed to their plan. Take a look at their extensive description of what they plan to do at their website. What do you think?

WEST COVINA, CA, Mar 16, 2006 (MARKET WIRE via COMTEX) .... According to B2.0, early in the next decade SIG will begin placing huge, mile-wide sheets of solar cells in earth orbit. These NASA-designed structures, called solar power satellites, will convert sunlight into electricity, then use weak, pollution-free, environmentally safe microwave beams to send that energy down to simple antennas anywhere on Earth. The antennas will convert the beams back into electricity and feed it into standard existing power grids at an extremely low cost. The system will operate 24/7 overcoming the drawback of rooftop solar cells and windmills.

Cypress: Solar Power to be Competitive in Five Years

Solar power will be competitive with mainstream electricity generation method in five years according to Cypress Semiconductor, which has a solar cell manufacturing subsidiary, SunPower.  Norm Taffe, executive vice president of Cypress, said that "We're four to five years away from the point at which solar is cost-effective with traditional electricity generation without any subsidy."

SunPower has a higher conversion efficiency of 20%, the highest in the industry and doesn't see much improvement in that, rather sees cost savings coming from increasing production efficiencies.

Cypress's forecast of when solar PV costs will be competitive with traditional electricity generation is optimistic by my usually optimistic estimates, at least for silicon PV cells.  SunPower, because of its affiliation with Cypress doesn't have to worry nearly as much about silicon supplies, but that doesn't mean that their cost will be any less.  According to forecasts I have seen, we will have a silicon shortage until 2009.  Until then cost reductions, for the most part, will come from using less silicon by making the cells thinner and recycling scrap silicon more efficiently.  The thin-film PV suppliers will, in the meantime, be ramping up their production, so that by 2009 a couple of them should be among the top ten suppliers at a lower cost than conventional silicon PV suppliers, but not competitive with conventional electricity. I believe that solar PV will eventually be competitive with traditional electricity production, but not for 7 to 10 years.  The volume of solar cell production required to make a dent in the market for electricity is so great that production rates of several gigawatts a year will be required from several suppliers - that is a difficult feat to accomplish in a short time.  It is likely that gigawatt production quantities are required to get the production costs down to a competitive level.  Silicon, or for that matter supplies of raw materials for thin-film manufacturers, will be pressed to keep up with that demand.  That is what I see as the Achilles heel of PV solar and why thermal and concentrating PV will be in the mix for a long time and may be the winner in the long term because of their dominant position.

Technorati tags: solar, solar power, PV+solar, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: Cypress: Solar Power to be Competitive in Five Years

Geothermal Power to Double

A new survey shows a major surge in developing geothermal power projects in the U.S. Some 45 projects are underway that could nearly double U.S. geothermal power output according to the Geothermal Energy Association (GEA) -- the industry trade group. The U.S. had 2,828 MW of geothermal power capacity on-line in 2005.

The survey identified new power projects in Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, New Mexico, Nevada, Oregon and Utah. These projects, when developed, would provide between 1,820 MW and 2095 MW of new electric power for the grid. This would be enough electricity to meet the needs of cities the size of Albuquerque, Las Vegas, Sacramento and Seattle combined, GEA noted.

OPD Ships First Pelamis Wave Generator

Ocean Power Delivery Ltd (OPD) shipped the first of three 750kW Pelamis machines from Scotland to Portugal for installation in the world's first commercial wave farm to be operated by a Portuguese consortium led by Enersis SA.  The machines will be delivered to the Port of Peniche where they will undergo final assembly prior to commissioning and installation later this year at a site 5km off the coast of northern Portugal, near to Póvoa de Varzim. The 2.25MW system will be the first stage of a 24MW plant.

OPD has secured a Letter of Intent for a further 28 machines to complete the plant once the first phase has been successfully installed and commissioned.  The first full scale pre-production prototype has been built and is undergoing tests at the European Marine Energy Center in Orkney.

Crude, Gasoline Prices Remain High

Prices for crude oil are above $60/bbl and gasoline prices are rising again. This excerpt from the March 15 issure of This Week in Petroleum expresses a rationale for continued high prices for crude oil and gasoline:

While it is true that crude oil imports over the past four weeks are down slightly compared to the same period last year, this is happening with crude oil prices $5 to $10 per barrel higher than a year ago, and with crude oil inventories nearly 32 million barrels (more than 10 percent) higher, as well. With prices significantly higher and inventory levels the highest in almost seven years, it may be somewhat surprising that import levels are as high as they are. But to many buyers, $60 crude oil can still be

Floating Gas-to-Liquids Plants Proposed

Syntroleum Corp., Tulsa, has signed a letter of intent to form a joint venture with Bluewater Energy Services BV to develop and finance gas-to-liquids plants on offshore floating production, storage, and offloading (FPSO) vessels.

By using this GTL/Oil FPSO technology concept, companies can develop offshore gas reserves (stranded gas) that otherwise would be uneconomical and in the process avoid costs of reinjection of natural gas back into the reservoir.

The purpose of the joint venture is to develop, construct, own and operate GTL/Oil FPSO vessels. The companies are working together to identify projects that will allow the joint venture to participate in the upstream development of oil and gas reserves and the downstream processing of those at offshore locations. A detailed feasibility study conducted by the companies has addressed a design of up to 17,000 barrels per day of Fischer-Tropsch (FT) products, 40,000 barrel per day of crude oil, and 10,000 barrels per day of condensate on a FPSO vessel, which would include around 2.3 million barrels of storage capacity. The GTL/Oil FPSO study follows Syntroleum’s work with its GTL barge concept for shallow water.

Resource: Syntroleum/Bluewater to Form Joint Venture, Bluewater press release, March 6, 2006

Technorati tags: gas-to-liquids, stranded gas, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: Floating Gas-to-Liquids Plants Proposed

Ethanol From Tires Via Plasma Converter Plus Fischer Tropsch

Future Fuels, Inc. (FFI) and Startech Environmental Corporation (OTC BB: STHK.OB) have signed a global strategic alliance to obtain contracts for waste-to-ethanol facilities and also for FFI's own $84 million waste-to-energy facility to be constructed in Toms River, New Jersey. FFI has issued a letter of intent to Startech for purchase and installation of a 100 ton-per-day Startech Plasma Converter System (PCS) for installation at Toms River, scheduled to go on line in late 2007.  Plans also call for the Toms River Facility expansion to include a series of additional Startech 100 ton-per-day PCSs.

The Toms River Facility will produce 52 million gallons per year of ethanol from used tires.  The PCS, using a plasma that reaches 30,000 degrees Centigrade, will first completely destroy the tires, producing a synthesis gas called Plasma Converted Gas (PCG). For each unit of electrical energy the Converter uses it will produce between four and ten units of energy residing in the PCG. The PCG, a mixture of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen is the input for FFI's catalytic ethanol synthesis process, a modified Fischer-Tropsch process.  The process applies heat and pressure in the presence of a catalyst to chemically transform the PCG into ethanol. 

Scuderi Engine Claims Highest Efficiency

The Scuderi Group has recently received quite a bit of publicity about its efforts to develop the Scuderi Split-Cycle Engine – potentially the world’s most efficient internal combustion engine.

The engine achieves its improved performance by separating the functions of the four cycle engine into an intake/compression cylinder and a power/exhaust cylinder.  Gas is compressed in the compression cylinder and transferred to the power cylinder through a gas passage. The gas passage includes a set of valves, which maintain a precharged pressure through all four strokes of the cycle. These two cylinders perform their respective functions once per crankshaft revolution, while typically conventional engines require two revolutions of the crankshaft to perform these functions. As a result, the split-cycle design provides more flexibility in how engines are built. A video showing how the engine works can be found here. 

GE Develops Equipment That Reduces Capital Cost of Producing Hydrogen

GE researchers have built a prototype of an apparatus that they believe could lead to a commercial machine able to produce hydrogen via electrolysis for about $3 per kilogram -- a quantity roughly equivalent in energy content to a gallon of gasoline -- down from today's $8 per kilogram. That could make it economically practical for future fuel-cell vehicles that run on hydrogen.

Hydrogen is made in an electrolyzer with a simple process, water is mixed with a potassium hydroxide electrolyte and flowed through a stack of electrodes. Electricity causes the water molecules to split into hydrogen and oxygen gases, which bubble out of the solution. Today commercial-scale quantities of hydrogen are extracted far more cheaply from natural gas. In a hydrogen economy, natural gas will become very expensive and other uses of natural gas than for vehicle transportation will be given a higher priority.

According to GE improving the efficiency is not the core problem, rather it is reducing the capital cost of the equipment used to produce the hydrogen.  Electrolyzers are currently made of expensive materials and require costly assembly labor.   

Huge Concentrating PV Collector to Start Tests

Israel's National Solar Energy Center will start testing a 400 square meter (4,300 sq ft) solar collecting dish, the big dish, capable of achieving 1000 suns (concentration the intesity of the suns enegy by a factor of 1000).

The dish is lined with 216 mirrors, but not more than a quarter will be uncovered to sunlight for the initial experiments. The mirrors concentrate the light onto a small square of concentrator photovoltaic cells, which convert the light into electricity. The concentrator photovoltaic panel is only 10 cm by 10 cm and is too small to absorb the energy from the whole dish.  An array of cells large enough to absorb all of the collectors energy would be about 65 cm x 65 cm. The testing will progress in stages, first at 20 suns, then with 40 suns and so on up to 100 suns.

According to a study the center's director, professor David Faiman, published last year, mass producing dish systems like the Sede Boker model would cost less than $1,000 per kilowatt to produce -- the cost of a typical, fossil-fuel burning plant.

Resource:

Researchers prepare to test solar dish, Leah Krauss, UPI, March 7, 2006
Firm Plans Gigawatt-Capable Solar Plants, Leah Krauss, UPI, March 7, 2006

Technorati tags: solar, concentrating solar PV, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: Huge Concentrating PV Collector to Start Tests

EEStor Update

Tyler, the Clean Break publisher is also a technology reporter and columnist for the Toronto Star.  In one of his recent columns in the Star he reported on EEStor's ultracapacitor and found a few previously unreported items about the company. His lead "A much-shrouded idea could give portable power a real charge, for a change — and change, well, everything" was one of the main themes of the column. The item I found most exciting was the following:

The company, sources say, is weeks away from seeking independent verification of the product's performance, which will be conducted by the University of Texas at Austin or a U.S. army facility. If all goes well, EEStor could be in preproduction this year and full production in 2007. During this time, potential customers — from automakers and military contractors to tool and electronics makers — will get a closer look at the product.

One of the experts he quoted was Richard Baxter author of the book on Energy Storage that The Energy Blog recently reviewed. 

The most One hang up that many, not Tyler, have on the technology is that it would require enormous bursts of power to charge the ultracapacitor in the short recharge times that are referred to when discussing this technology. 1) the short recharge time is essential to increasing the efficiency of energy recovery from braking that present batteries can't do. 2) most charging should be done overnight in the owners garage. 3) "filling stations" will need to charge some sort of energy storage system, such as more ultracapacitors or more likely flow batteries or other energy storage systems. (I'm not expert enough to know which technology is best) using off peak power if available, or during lulls in activity at the filling station, rather than imposing a extremely high demand on the grid for the short bursts of power that would be required for "refueling". Whatever method is used it will be quite a bit more expensive to buy electricity from filling stations rather than recharging overnight at home or in the parking lot at your workplace.

Technorati tags: ultracapacitors, energy storage, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: EEStor Update

Solar Overview on CNET

An overview of the solar industry on CNET's News.com courtesy of Clean Break gives a review of the some of the companies involved in the various solar technologies that regular readers of The Energy Blog will recognize. The article is worth a read. The article is written from the perspective that if so many venture capitalists are putting money into these technologies it must be a sign that it is the real thing. It adds a few more names that I will have to investigate and perhaps be the subject of a future post.  Surprisingly it does not mention some of the companies that are leading the charge.  There are so many new companies in the solar arena that we are going to have a period of significant drop-outs or consolidation in the years to come.

Please note that I have subdivided the solar category for my posts into four categories because one category was becoming too unwieldly. Solar-PV is still rather large and may have to be broken down into silicon and non-silicon categories.

Technorati tags: solar, solar power, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: Solar Overview on CNET

Concentrix Concentrating Photovoltaic Technology

Concentrix Solar GmbH is a start-up company that was created to develop a technology that uses concentrating modules which focus sunlight on high-performance photovoltaic (PV) cells, which in turn convert the solar energy into electricity. Concentrix has begun delivery of a series of pilot units to analyze the technology’s commercial viability. In parallel the company is establishing an automated production line to manufacture the modules.  The company’s target market is large-scale plants located in the sunniest regions of the world.

The technology, called FLATCON®, uses glass Fresnel lenses to focus direct sunlight on a a 2mm-diameter focal point on a solar cell. By concentrating the sunlight by a factor of 500, the active portion of the solar cell surface is reduced to a mere fraction of that required in conventional solar panels. This results in significantly less material consumption and therefore lower production costs. This process permits the use of more expensive, high-quality cells which offer better efficiency because of their favorable thermodynamic properties. The efficiency rate can be increased by using dual or triple cell technology. This involves stacking two or three cells made from different semiconductor materials on top of one another. Each of the three cells is sensitized to a specific portion of the solar spectrum. This approach can lead to an efficiency rate of more than 35%. The semiconductor materials are synthesized using elements from the 3rd and 5th group (III-V) of the periodic table (galliumarsenid and germanium). III-V solar cells are produced in a single process.

Cost Comparisons for New Power Plants

Stone & Webster Management Consultants has prepared life-cycle cost calculations for most of the technologies likely to be used in new power plants.  Calculations were made for the following types of plants:

• Subcritical and supercritical pulverized coal,
• Circulating fluidized bed (CFB),
• Integrated gasification combined-cycle (IGCC),
• GE advanced boiling water reactor (ABWR),
• South African pebble bed modular reactor (PBMR) and
• Gas fired combined cycle power plants. 

The paper, presented at POWER-GEN International in Los Vegas in early December, presents a consistent comparison of the economics and risks of representative designs that are being considered in the power marketplace for projects requiring investments of $1 billion or more.

A brief description of each type of power plant and a list of assumptions, too long to go into here, are given.  Results of the calculations are presented in graphic form for total capital investment in dollars and dollars per kW, levelized production costs (cost of electricity produced) and a comparison of costs for coal plants with and without sequestration. 

Concentrating PV Solar

I wrote a long, long comment on the status of solar energy, most of it on concentrating PV solar, on a post in Cleantechblog which can be found here.  I got carried away a little, as my comments are longer than Neal's blog.  So I am referring you to it, and counting it as my second blog of the day.

Technorati tags: solar, solar power, concentrating solar power, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: Concentrating PV Solar

FuelCell Energies First Quarter Report

FuelCell Energy reported Results and Accomplishments for their first quarter of 2006, the period ending January 31, 2006.  Highlights were:

• Selected, with PPL, for 4 megawatt project in Connecticut
• Sited first 1 megawatt DFC installation in Japan for Sharp Corp.
• Targeted design cost for 2 MW plant approaches market clearing price
• Increased manufacturing production to 9 megawatts
• Selected by Department of Energy for $85 million coal-based multi-megawatt solid oxide fuel cell project

Commenting on the third item the report said:

Top priorities are continued reduction of the initial and life-cycle costs of the Company's products, and extending stack life from the current three years (24,000 hours) to five years (40,000 hours). To achieve profitability, product costs need to be in a range of $2,000 to $4,000 per kilowatt, depending on local electricity rates and fuel prices. Current design costs are now approximately $4,300 per kilowatt for the 1 megawatt product and $4,600 per kilowatt for the sub-megawatt product.

Extending FuelCell Energy's value engineering initiatives to the multi-megawatt DFC3000 power plant, the Company anticipates reducing the cost of this product to between $3,200 and $3,500 per kilowatt by the end of 2006, and below $3,000 per kilowatt with increased volume. This should be the Company's first product to show positive margins.

Further commentary can be found in the complete report which can be found here.

Technorati tags: fuel cells, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: FuelCell Energies First Quarter Report

Many Roles for Supercapacitors

EV World had a link to an interesting Components in Electronics article on supercapacitors today.  Based on an interview with Richard Balanson, CEO at Maxwell Technologies they pointed out the fast recharge time, measured in seconds rather than hours for the lead acid batteries that are usually used for energy storage along with their longer shelf life and operating life. The statement that they are "cheaper than an equivalent Li-ion cell but still dearer than a lead-acid battery" was a revelation that I had not seen before.  One of the most common uses are those where a battery is used for standby power and the ultracapacitor provides a pulse of energy for a critical operation. The digital cameras where ultracapacitors can provide the extra power needed for the flash and zoom functions is a good example of the pulse power applications of supercapacitors.

As far as applications are concerned they describe a wide variety of applications including hybrid vehicles, dustbin carts, automatic meter reader transmitting systems, wind turbines, sea buoys and sea lane markers, pagers, cell phones, digital cameras, vehicle tracking systems, monitoring systems on pipelines, valve actuators, door mechanisms on the Airbus, movable road signs, fork lift trucks, trams, car jump leads, handheld power tools, catapults on aircraft carriers and airbags in helicopters where supercapacitors are being used or are being considered for use.

For a primer on ultracapacitors see the earlier post About Ultracapacitors.

Technorati tags: energy storage, supercapacitors, energy, technology

The Energy Blog: Many Roles for Supercapacitors

When Will You Buy an Electric Car?

Would you buy an electric car when the price of gasoline gets to $4.00 a gallon?  $5.00?  $10.00?  A recent editorial in the Falls Church News-Press discusses the fact that, in their opinion and mine, that the day is going to come when we have insufficient liquid fuels for our cars and we will have to switch to electric cars.  They also discuss the status of battery technology, as we have here, that will be needed at that time.  They ignore the possibility of fuel cell cars, which will start becoming available, in at least small quantities, in 4-6 years; not a much different time frame than when plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles might be available.  Here are a few excerpts:

Whether peak oil arrives with a bang or just sort of sneaks up on us, it is highly unlikely that ten years from now there is going to be enough liquid fuel to power all the world's cars, trucks, buses, planes, trains, and boats. The responses of governments to this situation will vary by political temperament and circumstance. Some will mandate draconian conservation measures, some will impose rationing, and some will let rationing-by-price direct dwindling fuel supplies to those who can afford them.

Judging from the primal screams of "I-can't-afford-to-farm-at-these-energy-prices" that are appearing with increasing frequency in rural newspapers, the issue will eventually come down to eating or driving. This, of course, is not a choice; even the most free-market Congressman will soon get the message that there are priorities for our dwindling supplies of liquid fuels, and that gasoline for the privately owned vehicles ranks close to the bottom of this list.

Additional Hydrogen Storage Information

While researching the previous post on the Honda micro CHP system I came across this information on hydrogen storage in their fuel cell vehicle.  I have added this paragraph to the recent hydrogen storage post, but I am posting it here for those of you that have already read that post. This is the first storage system that I have seen that appears to be near what will be required in a commercial fuel cell vehicle (FCV).  Honda said in January that they would begin production of a FCV that would be very close to their FCX in 3 or 4 years.

Honda had this phrase in their announcement of their newest model of their fuel cell car, the 2006 FCX: Honda has now developed a new approach to expanding storage capacity, a newly developed hydrogen absorption material in the tank doubles capacity to 5 kg of hydrogen at 5000 PSI, extending cruising range to 350 miles, equivalent to that of a gasoline-engine car. The tank is located behind the rear seat. No other details were given, but I presume that by increasing the tank pressure to 5,000 PSI they were able to increase the capacity of absorbent material to an acceptable value. This is the same pressure as is used in most cars using a simple pressure vessel and has the accompanying disadvantages of the high pressure, but requires much less volume than a simple tank.

Honda Annnounces First Installation of Micro-CHP System

American Honda Motor Company and Massachusetts-based Climate Energy, LLC have collaborated in the first test installation of a micro-sized combined heat and power system (Micro-CHP system).  At the Braintree, Mass., residence of Mr. Bernard Malin, the Climate Energy system is now using cogeneration technology with natural gas to provide residential heat more efficiently than ever before, given the added benefit of producing electric power.

Honda supplies its compact home-use cogeneration unit to Climate Energy, which in turn, combines it with a furnace or boiler as a supplemental system to conventional space heating and electric power in new and existing homes, while delivering ultra-quiet operation.

The complete Climate Energy Micro-CHP system, powered by the Honda MCHP unit, results in more than 85 percent efficiency in converting fuel energy into useful heat and electric power.  The system also is expected to yield a 30 percent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions as compared with conventional heating appliances and grid supplied electricity.

DOE: CO2 Ehanced Oil Recovery Could Add 89 Billion BBL to Reserves

State-of-the-art enhanced oil recovery with carbon dioxide, now recognized as a potential way of dealing with greenhouse gas emissions, could add 89 billion barrels to the recoverable oil resources of the United States, the Department of Energy has determined.  Current U.S. proved reserves are 21.9 billion barrels.  Multiple advances in technology and widespread sequestration of industrial CO2 could eventually add as much as 430 billion new barrels to the technically recoverable resource.  Beginning efforts to develop the 89-billion-barrel addition to resources would depend on the availability of commercial CO2 in large volumes.

If this oil could be added to the category of proven reserves, the U.S. would have the fifth largest oil reserves in the world behind Iraq, which has 115 billion barrels, based on present estimates; and an additional 430 billion barrels would make it first, ahead of Saudi Arabia with 261 billion barrels. 

Medicine Bow CTL Project

Significant progress is being made on development of the largest coal liquefaction plant in the US. Medicine Bow Fuel & Power LLC (MBF&P), a wholly-owned subsidiary of DKRW Advanced Fuels LLC (DKRW), headquartered in Houston, Texas has signed licenses to use key technologies and an agreement for the coal supply. DKRW's proposed coal-to-liquids facility is in Medicine Bow, Wyoming. The first phase of the Medicine Bow project is designed to produce approximately 11,000 bpd of ultra-clean diesel fuel and other fuels from Carbon Basin coal. MBF&P plans to eventually expand the plant capacity to 40,000 bpd. DKRW had previously announced that construction was to begin in 2006, with initial operations to begin in the 2008-2010 timeframe.

It announced on March 1 that it has signed a site license agreement with GE Infrastructure Technology LLC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the General Electric Company (NYSE:GE), for the use of GE's patented and proprietary coal gasification technology.

DKRW also has an agreement with Rentech, Inc. (AMEX:RTK), a Denver based technology company to license their Fischer Tropsch technology for use in the Project.

MBF&P has already entered into an agreement with Arch Coal Inc. (NYSE:ACI), the second largest U.S. coal miner owner and operator, for the purchase of high btu, low sulfur coal from the Carbon Basin Reserve. Arch will act as constructor and operator for the Medicine Bow coal mine sufficient to support the first phase of the Medicine Bow project and to expand up to 40,000 bpd.

Hydrogen Storage Systems

Hydrogen storage is one of the most critical components of a hydrogen fueled PEMFC vehicle.  Some believe that the hydrogen storage system will be the major obstacle delaying deployment of a sucessful fuel cell vehicle. Conventional fuel tanks for the storage of hydrogen (H2) in fuel cell vehicles have several associated issues. 

• It must be a pressure vessel to store any significant amount of hydrogen.
• When stored at 5,000 or 10,000 psi a reasonable sized tank can't store enough hydrogen for the length of trip, about 300 miles, that is typical in current gasoline or diesel powered vehicles.
• There are concerns about the saftey of a pressurized tank in case of an accident.
• A complicated filling nozzle/tank nozzle arrangement is necessary for safety and to prevent spills.
• It is expensive, estimated to cost $2,000 to $3,000.

Several alternate means of storage have been proposed and are in various stages of being developed.  The large number of options being considered is because no technology has, as of yet, been proven to be a satisfactory solution.

• Improved Composite Tanks for Compressed Hydrogen
• Liquid Hydrogen Tanks
• Metal Hydrides
• Chemical Hydride Slurries
• Carbon Based Materials

The Changing Energy Market

I thought it would be interesting to share the view point of the CEO of one of the worlds largest oil companies on the future of energy.  On 27 February 2006, Lord Browne, BP's Group Chief Executive, delivered a speech "The changing energy market."  The following are a few brief excerpts from the speech.  It is suggested that you read the whole speech to totally understand his perspective.

.... So let me offer you four facts, and one conclusion.

The first and most fundamental fact is that the demand for energy continues to increase, driven by population growth and by the gradual spread of prosperity.

Over the last twenty four hours, the world’s population has risen by almost a quarter of million – as it does every day, week in, week out. 10,000 new citizens every hour. ....

The second fact is that the United States, Europe, Japan and now China and India, are all significant importers - of both oil and natural gas.

And in each case the requirement for imports is likely to grow.

The forecast for ten years from now is that, worldwide, 70 per cent of total oil consumption and 40 per cent of all natural gas demand will be supplied through trade.

Sterling Energy Systems Featured in Design News

High Efficiency Stirling Engine Key to Energy Conversion, a feature article about Sterling Energy System's solar dish system, appeared in the January 9 issue of Design News .  Quite an interesting article for those of you that are interested in the details of how the system is made.

Their dish/engine concentrating solar power system uses a mirror in the shape of a dish to collect and concentrate the sun's heat onto a small area where a receiver is located.  The receiver transfers the sun's energy to a Stirling cycle engine, that converts the energy into power.  Dish/engine concentrating systems were the subject of this earlier post.

The article goes into quite a bit of detail about the mechanical design of the system, which I have not seen anywhere else.  It explains the Stirling cycle, the Stirling engine that they are using and gives quite a bit of detail about the mechanism that is used in the tracking system they use to position the dish so that it follows the position of the sun.

More blogs about solar, thermal solar, alternative energy, renewable, renewable energy, energy, technology