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Obama Wants Research to Wean Vehicles off Oil.....

A car in motion generates way more energy than what a basic car battery can hold. Why not have bigger batteries or multiple batteries to capture the extra juice? Not to mention you could put "pin wheels" on the inside of a cars grill that would spin via air creating even more energy.. The heat generated by an engine could also be used.

I suppose my point is that a vehicle generates so much energy but the typical vehicle only recycles 10% of the energy it creates.

One shouldn't have to plug their car into a wall outlet - that is just stupid and unnecessary.

There is no such thing as "free energy" however in theory a car could recycle it's energy....
To be precise, a car does not "generate" energy, it uses some and stores some. The energy it uses was "generated" in a solar furnace 93MM miles away. The energy to spin your pinwheels in the grille came from the energy stored in the fuel. Add the power generation of those pinwheels and their generator to the whole thing, and it costs you the extra drag from turning them, less the inefficiencies of the engine that burned the fuel (maybe 35% efficient) and the inefficiencies of the propeller and generator (probably no more than 40% efficient on a good day, so your energy saving device will cost you 1/(.35 x .4) or about 7 times what you "generated". Everything you incorporate into the car to try to recover some of the energy you can NOT avoid using (regenerative braking for instance) not only has inefficiencies in operation, but you now have to spend the money and the fuel to drag all of that stuff around until you need it. So the energy recovery potential is not that great.

What really matters is that Americans by and larger don't give a flying purple frick about efficiency. You have been able to buy 50+ MPG diesel cars from VW almost continuously since 1978, and how many did you ever see on the road? Europeans - who DO care a BIT more about such things - have been able to buy 80+ mpg VW cars since 1995 (3 litre Lupo) and will soon be able to buy a nice, two seat commuter that gets about 270mpg overall. If it was for sale here, nobody but a few elderly hippies with big trust accounts would spend the bux to buy one. Instead we buiy SUVs and pickups to compete with each other for how much fuel we can waste.

Of course, if you/me/we gave a damn about resource waste, we would simply stay home or ride public transport.
 
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The government is not a for-profit entity.
Try again.

LOL !!!

What f***in difference does it make Kush ?

You Want to make a liberal politician cry like a little girl take away their funding.
 
To be precise, a car does not "generate" energy, it uses some and stores some. The energy it uses was "generated" in a solar furnace 93MM miles away. The energy to spin your pinwheels in the grille came from the energy stored in the fuel. Add the power generation of those pinwheels and their generator to the whole thing, and it costs you the extra drag from turning them, less the inefficiencies of the engine that burned the fuel (maybe 35% efficient) and the inefficiencies of the propeller and generator (probably no more than 40% efficient on a good day, so your energy saving device will cost you 1/(.35 x .4) or about 7 times what you "generated". Everything you incorporate into the car to try to recover some of the energy you can NOT avoid using (regenerative braking for instance) not only has inefficiencies in operation, but you now have to spend the money and the fuel to drag all of that stuff around until you need it. So the energy recovery potential is not that great.

What really matters is that Americans by and larger don't give a flying purple frick about efficiency. You have been able to buy 50+ MPG diesel cars from VW almost continuously since 1978, and how many did you ever see on the road? Europeans - who DO care a BIT more about such things - have been able to buy 80+ mpg VW cars since 1995 (3 litre Lupo) and will soon be able to buy a nice, two seat commuter that gets about 270mpg overall. If it was for sale here, nobody but a few elderly hippies with big trust accounts would spend the bux to buy one. Instead we buiy SUVs and pickups to compete with each other for how much fuel we can waste.

Of course, if you/me/we gave a damn about resource waste, we would simply stay home or ride public transport.

A battery can only take so much of a charge and every ounce of energy after that goes to waste.

I think oil is fine and I'm not on some environmental mission - I just think that it is highly stupid to waste perfectly good energy.

The energy is there, we just need a viable system to use it - that or generate more.

Honestly I'm more interested in magnets.... I've taken magnets and spun a fan with them - if I can do that then I can generate energy. All it really takes is correct positioning and polarity... The only reason why I would not call that "free energy" is the simple fact I had to use my energy to make it happen.

I charged a battery just doing that but I used several small fans.
 
What f***in difference does it make Kush ?

It makes quite a bit of difference. Do you agree the motivations for maintaining a for(economic)-profit entity or a government are extremely different. You know, the whole thing about stakeholders being the proverbial shareholders of government and how this is in contrast to the firm....

You Want to make a liberal politician cry like a little girl take away their funding.

It is not a political thing. Take away a "conservatives" funding and they will cry like a girl. Which is all the more perplexing given the alternate definitions of conservatism.
 
Tesla had some ideas and theories... Too bad he was thought of as a "crackpot" back in his day.

Also, magnets/electromagnetics are another interesting solution..


Yep, all good reasons for further research.
 
Tesla had some ideas and theories... Too bad he was thought of as a "crackpot"
back in his day.

Also, magnets/electromagnetics are another interesting solution..

Tesla had "ideas" ?

Lol.....sry Tesla has been a idol of mine since I was seven.

He wasn't a crackpot, he was just viewed and lived in the shadow of Eddison. The real crackpot

Eddison focused on DC, Tesla on AC. For the amount of discoveries and applied data Eddison gave us Tesla gave us exponentially more.

He for one patented the induction motor, which he then sold to Westinghouse. To this day the Induction motor is used in every home, every office building, every chemical or industrial plant

He pioneered the use of electro-magnetic induction. Transformers, whether they're hanging on a pole out side your home or stuffed into every electronic component you own they're part of everyday life for all of us.

He built a wireless transmiter called the Wyecliff Tower, he pioneered the study of tuned circuits and he built the Tesla coil.

I tried to build a Tesla Coil when I was 14 and was about 75% through before my Dad figured out what I was doing and destroyed it, and grounded me.

Eddison wanted to power the world with DC. Imagine 6" diameter power lines buried underground with boosting stations every mile.

Tesla was the true genius, he was decades ahead of his time and he was robbed.

As far as using any of his devices for energy conservation its being done already. The basic " switching power" supply which uses a switching transistor to output a saw tooth waveform into the primary side of a transformer are extremely efficient.

And they're in every Computer, flat screen tv or electronic device you own.
 
Tesla had "ideas" ?

Lol.....sry Tesla has been a idol of mine since I was seven.

He wasn't a crackpot, he was just viewed and lived in the shadow of Eddison. The real crackpot

Eddison focused on DC, Tesla on AC. For the amount of discoveries and applied data Eddison gave us Tesla gave us exponentially more.

He for one patented the induction motor, which he then sold to Westinghouse. To this day the Induction motor is used in every home, every office building, every chemical or industrial plant

He pioneered the use of electro-magnetic induction. Transformers, whether they're hanging on a pole out side your home or stuffed into every electronic component you own they're part of everyday life for all of us.

He built a wireless transmiter called the Wyecliff Tower, he pioneered the study of tuned circuits and he built the Tesla coil.

I tried to build a Tesla Coil when I was 14 and was about 75% through before my Dad figured out what I was doing and destroyed it, and grounded me.

Eddison wanted to power the world with DC. Imagine 6" diameter power lines buried underground with boosting stations every mile.

Tesla was the true genius, he was decades ahead of his time and he was robbed.

As far as using any of his devices for energy conservation its being done already. The basic " switching power" supply which uses a switching transistor to output a saw tooth waveform into the primary side of a transformer are extremely efficient.

And they're in every Computer, flat screen tv or electronic device you own.

Yeah well Tesla IS my idol too.

I said Tesla WAS VIEWED as a crackpot NOT THAT HE IS PRESENTLY..

The best part is that we have nearly identical names and are into the same ****...

If reincarnation exists I'm him or I'm me.

Also, I don't need a history lesson - I'm probably one of the top 5 posters here on knowledge of history (among other subjects).
 
It has nothing to do with conspiracy, but with the ability to derive profit. Energy efficiency is not profitable for energy providers. This is simply a matter of fact.

Like I said, a conspiracy theory.

The part you're missing, is that the oil companies would be all over an energy source that, though it may be way more efficient, will be cheaper to produce, thereby lowering their overhead.

It's business 101.
 
Too bad it's just a political ploy and nothing will come of it.

Yeah, the GOP will block it like they block all legislation that leads to a more prosperous future for working Americans. It's almost as if conservatives don't want working people to prosper. Hmm, there might be something to that.
 
Like I said, a conspiracy theory.

I have not hinted that companies are mothballing profitable endeavors, so it appears there is a reading comprehension issue.

The part you're missing, is that the oil companies would be all over an energy source that, though it may be way more efficient, will be cheaper to produce, thereby lowering their overhead.

It's business 101.

:shrug: Why bother....
 
I have not hinted that companies are mothballing profitable endeavors, so it appears there is a reading comprehension issue.



:shrug: Why bother....

You didn't hint to it...you flat out said it.

Try again!

If alternative energy provided short-term profitability, oil companies would be all over it by now. This a major motivation behind mothballing promising research.
 
You didn't hint to it...you flat out said it.

I said that it is not profitable. Companies mothball promising research because they are focused on returns. Extraction and refinement of fossil fuels is simply more profitable. It does not diminish the research in more efficient (not profitable) fuel sources. Remember, firms can only exist 100 years from now by staying profitable today.
 
I said that it is not profitable. Companies mothball promising research because they are focused on returns. Extraction and refinement of fossil fuels is simply more profitable. It does not diminish the research in more efficient (not profitable) fuel sources. Remember, firms can only exist 100 years from now by staying profitable today.

Alternative energy isn't profitable, because it's inefficient at best and doesn't work, at worst.
 
Alternative energy isn't profitable, because it's inefficient at best and doesn't work, at worst.

Your ill-informed opinions have gone on long enough. Why not actually contribute something to the topic instead of partisan nonsense? The majority of R&D from energy producers goes into researching more efficient extraction processes. Why? Because they are very efficient at extracting fossil fuels, and reducing the cost of production through technology equates to more profits. We can refer to this as research leveraged cost reduction. Alternative energy is not profitable because there is not a true market for it (AE is a niche market that is bottlenecked logistically from a fixed cost perspective.).
 
The constitution IS the law which were supposed to hold people account to. So YET AGAIN, if youre saying it doesnt matter, then how are we supposed to hold them accountable?

The Constitution is outdated and doesn't address many modern issues, so no... if you can't tell the difference between a 250 year old document and modern day laws, you have issues.
 
Honestly I'm more interested in magnets.... I've taken magnets and spun a fan with them - if I can do that then I can generate energy. All it really takes is correct positioning and polarity... The only reason why I would not call that "free energy" is the simple fact I had to use my energy to make it happen.
You are just re-inventing the electric motor (see post above regarding Nicola Tesla - he was spinning things with magnets almost two centuries ago).
 
Yeah, the GOP will block it like they block all legislation that leads to a more prosperous future for working Americans. It's almost as if conservatives don't want working people to prosper. Hmm, there might be something to that.

No, Obama is just trying to score some political cred, he knows that it's just money wasted, like it has been every other time we've flushed money down the alternative energy hole.
 
Pfft! All elements are limited!

Indeed, and some more so than oil at present. Where is the wisdom of making a costly transition to techs that depend upon non-renewables that are more scarce than oil?

You didn't pay attention. The price went down, without tax credits.

You haven't shown that. Since when hasn't the solar industry received government subsidy?

An ever increasing effect.

100 pennies is still only one dollar. We could double the number of those who pop a panel on their roof and it still would be insignificant to the overall system.

I never said it would be done overnight! And the more breakthrough discoveries, the quicker the transition away from expensive and damaging fossil fuels.

Once again, those discoveries have been made. The alternatives are here. Oil and coal remain dominant because they have the highest efficiency and are the cheapest in price. In terms of vehicle fuel, again - the discoveries have been made, but the efficiencies are off for the non-petro fuels or the tradeoff in their use is unacceptable.

I personally have used alternatives for quite some time before I stopped driving. Started with propane, then went to SVO/WVO. Finally settled on B80 when it hit the Sun stations. But it's too much hassle for most folks and the state screwed the pooch heavily thinking they were helping with their own bio-diesel initiative. They started requiring that all diesel fuel sold in the state have a 5% bio-diesel component. Overnight it stripped the stocks of commercial bio-diesel and pegged the price upward. Thanks guys!
 
There is a lot of promise in switchgrass. A place near me has done a lot of research on it. It is just not clear the environmental/economic side of growing that much of it.
 
There is a lot of promise in switchgrass. A place near me has done a lot of research on it. It is just not clear the environmental/economic side of growing that much of it.

Algae is another promising source. I like it a bit better as it has the same oil content but it doesn't require tracts of land or fresh water to cultivate. It cleans brakish water and the leftovers are gold. Algae sugar - 100 sweeter than table sugar. The leftover biomass can be further processed to bio-jet fuel or fertilizer use.

The cities using sewerage for a bio-diesel stock use bacteria to process. It's probably the most efficient and easy manufacture.
 
Algae is another promising source. I like it a bit better as it has the same oil content but it doesn't require tracts of land or fresh water to cultivate. It cleans brakish water and the leftovers are gold. Algae sugar - 100 sweeter than table sugar. The leftover biomass can be further processed to bio-jet fuel or fertilizer use.

The cities using sewerage for a bio-diesel stock use bacteria to process. It's probably the most efficient and easy manufacture.

Yeah they have done some research on that at the same place. I forget what concern they expressed toward it though I recall there was some--maybe the production rate. Switchgrass could create a lot of jobs as a bonus--it would be good use for old tobacco fields for instance that now largely lay fallow. Not sure algae would create the jobs though. I am sure they will come up with something eventually--it is just a matter of getting a mass produced standard product.
 
Main problem with algae is extracting the oil and separation from the sugars and other biomass. It hampers production in quantity.
 
You are just re-inventing the electric motor (see post above regarding Nicola Tesla - he was spinning things with magnets almost two centuries ago).

I'm not - I'm just "progressing" ideas or continuing existing ideas.

My models and mechanics are advanced.
 
Algae is another promising source. I like it a bit better as it has the same oil content but it doesn't require tracts of land or fresh water to cultivate. It cleans brakish water and the leftovers are gold. Algae sugar - 100 sweeter than table sugar. The leftover biomass can be further processed to bio-jet fuel or fertilizer use.

The cities using sewerage for a bio-diesel stock use bacteria to process. It's probably the most efficient and easy manufacture.
During my eldest daughters days in grad school, she was working with bio-D and bio-lubes. The days of crop-based bio-D are limited - and in the case of the US exist mostly because of the idiotic farm direct cash subsidies. Algae had some promise, but bio-tech has moved on long past that stage already - as you point out to bacterium. They can be tailor made to produce the exact product desired, and do so without the risks of monoculture and the very costly need to perform recovery and separation from plant matter.
 
Perhaps I'll be proven wrong but I would bet very highly that bio-fuels will never be the next generation of transportation fuels. I highly suspect the answer comes in the form of progressively improving electric cars matched with more efficient, higher output, electrical grid that incorporates solar (especially if you can get solar satellites and microwave transmission), nuclear, natural, gas, coal, etc.
 
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