The Clockwork Mansion

I'd like to know what you all think about the disaster in the gulf, what with all the oil causing the closures of oyster beds, and how this is going to negatively impact Louisiana and the rest of the gulf coast.

I think that this is going to make oysters prohibitively expensive over the next several years, so much so that the industry may just fail altogether.  Prices are already being affected.  One of the deli's that I go to here has set the price for an oyster poboy from $10 to $15 (depending on the size of the sandwich), where it was less than half of that before the disaster.  And if the FDA law that's supposed to be going to take effect next year (LINK) (http://www.houmatoday.com/article/20100120/ARTICLES/100129939?Title=Oyster-industry-in-D-C-fighting-summer-ban) that would basically require all oysters harvested in the summer months to be sterilized with specialized equipment that the harvesters would have to buy (to eliminate a rare disease, btw), thereby raising the price, the pollution would only multiply that price hike so much so that the supply of oysters would dwindle until no one buys them anymore.  I know it doesn't seem like much, it's only oysters.  But it's a serious thing down here in Louisiana, as the seafood industry is one of the primary forces behind our economy.  The main reason our economy was doing so well is because of our independence in the seafood industry.  Now, this is all going to be hurting, badly.  They're even seeing oil slick on crab traps.  This may raise the price of crabs a bit, but I think that will survive.  But if this hits shrimp and crawfish, then the Louisiana economy will more than likely take a serious hit, and it won't be pretty.  Over the past couple of years, the crawfish harvest hasn't been all that great, and so the prices were high.  This year seems to be doing well, but with all the oil out there, what does the future hold for that part of the industry?  It used to be that sugar was a driving force in our economy, but not so anymore.  Most of the sugar cane fields have been sold off due to urban sprawl, and that's been going on since the 60's, as I understand.  I fear for my little state, I really do.

Thoughts?  Comments?

I think the great irony in all this was that the deep-sea drilling there was due to environmental concerns that a shallow-water oil rig would pollute too much.

Of course, this has led to what we see now:  the oil well is so deep underwater it makes all traditional methods of stopping it almost useless... which is just what quite a few people no one wanted to listen to warned about years ago (like me).

A shallow-water well could have been capped with the previous failed methods within a few days.  Look how easy it wass to stop the Iraq oil leaks and fires.  Just blast em with TNT and then cap them.  Dozens of such well fires were stopped in less than a week.  Let's face the facts.  When dealing with oil wells, you want them on land or close to shore for the simple reason that they'll much easier to control.

Working in deep water exponentially increases the difficulty if something goes wrong.

Not to mention, close-up to shore or on land, states can also impose their own inspection regulations so it adds another layer of scrutiny to ensure things are being done properly.

After this spill, I don't think anyone can dispute that deep-water drilling is higher prone to accidents getting out of control more easily than land or shallow water wells.

I've never been in favor of deep sea drilling. Honestly, I don't even want to see ANWR or shallow-sea drilling. If we can spend the money on drilling, we should instead spend it on clean energy to help get us off of oil instead of spending to feed this addiction. http://apolloalliance.org/

Quote from: Ryudo Lee on May 27, 2010, 01:46:25 PMI'd like to know what you all think about the disaster in the gulf, what with all the oil causing the closures of oyster beds, and how this is going to negatively impact Louisiana and the rest of the gulf coast.

Sigh.  You guys just keep getting it, don't you?  Hurricanes, oil spills, annual dead zones (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8ae2vq45eA)... (see also (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O5Edm_7MJg))

I think it's sad that environmentalists (the ones who are more mental then environment conscious) are going to spin this into a huge anti-oil thing when the technology is perfectly safe when properly maintained and correct procedure is followed- which is very much not the case with the deep horizon oil platform.

The problem is corruption in the government agency that's supposed to be monitoring them (the gas that caused the explosion would have been detected and safely dealt with if a battery in the apparatus that is there to detect gas had been replaced- this is something the government is supposed to be monitoring) and BP and the company running the platform, between them, ignoring proper procedure and not replacing a valve which blew earlier (see, a problem occurred in operation, the valve blew to stop the oil from spilling, and a ton of concrete was poured to stop the leak... all routine.  then they went ahead and continued operating without replacing that valve, which might have prevented the gas buildup that caused the explosion that sank the rig.)

I really don't have anything I can comment on how the oil is going to effect everything.  It's bad, no argument, and I doubt anyone can predict all the different ways that it will hurt people before it's cleaned up. (so much as it's possible to clean it up.)

Is anyone honestly surprised that *gasp* oil companies are trying to get around regulations? Seriously. This is the same company that the Bush EPA and the GOP-controlled Indiana government granted permission to increase the amount of mercury dumped into Lake Michigan from 2007 to 2012. Not to mention that BP has had several other serious safety violations at refineries before. In fact, one study pegs BP has being the source of 97% of willful safety violations at refineries cited by OSHA.  And what about the one refinery that went "kaboom" in Texas in '05? And if one expects a company to try to get around safety regulations, why in the world should we allow them to try something that could be this disastrous?  Worse, the "last resort" device that is supposed to prevent this has a 50% failure rate.  50%! Why is this "OK"? Not to mention the similarities between tactics being used to stop this spill and another spill waaaaaaaaaaay back in 1979. I'm being serious here, this play book we're seeing? It's three decades old. Top Hat? Top Kill? Junk Shot? Yeah, all these tactics were tried before in a previous spill. There might be a few tweaks here and there but it's basically the same ideas. At this point Americans should be feeling like Charlie Brown with Lucy as the oil companies.

They should never have gotten permission to drill like this in the first place. BP doesn't have the safety record to dig a ditch, much less a mile-deep well, and it's pretty clear they didn't (and likely still don't) have any real plan on what to do if a disaster like this did happen.

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_City_Refinery_(BP)

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/05/17/national/main6491769.shtml

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601072&sid=aKqG43JpQb2w

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#37368377

http://www.chicagotribune.com/services/chi-mercury_27jul27,0,6726083.story

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ixtoc_I_oil_spill

A scary thought.

China is looking to get oil-drilling rights from the Cubans.  SINOPEC of China has an agreement with CUPEC to develop Cuba's oil resources.  There are claims that it won't lead to any wells, but there has been seismic testing for oil and SINOPEC has a contract for joint production in a potential high-yield offshore area.

I know their history well enough to see how it will proceed:  They will deny there's going to be any drilling until they're half-way through building the rigs and can't deny it anymore.  Just like China denied there was anything wrong with their factory inspections until people started getting poisoned by melamine deliberately added to baby formula and pet to fool protein standards testing.   :P

The Gulf is teh doomed.   :P

Oil's well that Ends well.

Quote from: Alondro on May 28, 2010, 09:40:28 AMSINOPEC
CUPEC

Sino-Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries?
Cuban Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries?

Wouldn't that just be China or Cuba?

Edit: Wow.  There really is a company called Sinopec.

I really don't know what to think beyond the fact I'm not educated or qualified enough to make an informed decision about anything ranging from oil to green power.


All I can say is "Crap, it is a big mess"

Personally, I'm outraged.  And I live in Delaware...

BP currently has to pay only $75 million of the estimated $14 billion that would be needed to clean everything up.  This estimated amount for cleanup is likely much larger by now since the article is nearly a month old, but BP's payment remains the same.

Guess who gets to pay the rest?  Yeah, my taxes.

http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2010/05/big_oil_discount.html

P.S.

QuoteNot only is liability capped on compensatory damages from oil spills, but payment of punitive damages is also tax deductible.

Are you F-ing kidding me?  SUCCESSFULLY SUING THEM WILL LOWER THEIR TAXES!

folks, really all i can say is:

"it's industry, and accidents do happen, the best one can do is to learn from mistakes, and make damn sure they never happen again"

Is it terrible? Yes
Is it one of the worst environmental disasters in recent history? Yes.
Should those responsible be made to pay for their mistake? yes, and they are in several ways.
Should deep sea drilling be stopped? Not yet, all this will do in the long run is put technology on the table that'll make such accidents either a thing of the past, or a recoverable event in the very least.

Folks are also forgetting that while taxes are a pain in the arse, being smited for the full amount of the cleanup would likely cause more problems than good.
It's also worth noting that people are complaining more about the financial cost of this whole event, rather than the environmental damage.

what does that say about people? Yes, that most care about the environment just so long as they're not the ones having to fork out dough to protect it.

Quote from: Shachza on May 28, 2010, 08:13:52 PM
BP currently has to pay only $75 million of the estimated $14 billion that would be needed to clean everything up.  This estimated amount for cleanup is likely much larger by now since the article is nearly a month old, but BP's payment remains the same.

It gets worse...
I'm just double-checking out the Valdez in Wikipedia, but they were sued for $5 billion in punitive damages, only to have that get reduced to 75% of $507.5 mil. (Although they did get hit with "late fees" of $480 mil in 2009. Yeah, bastards still haven't paid it. It's not like the money isn't there...)

Out of approx. 53.1 million gallons of oil the Valdez was carrying, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says there's still around 26 thousand gallons of oil still in Alaska's soil.

But, as for how it really gets worse? They'll just jump up gas prices to recoup any and all fines they get.

Oh, and Consumerist is keeping up on the news: http://consumerist.com/2010/05/bp-oil-spill-more-like-12-19000-barrels-per-day.html (http://consumerist.com/2010/05/bp-oil-spill-more-like-12-19000-barrels-per-day.html)

Quote from: Turnsky on May 28, 2010, 11:00:11 PM
Folks are also forgetting that while taxes are a pain in the arse, being smited for the full amount of the cleanup would likely cause more problems than good.
It's also worth noting that people are complaining more about the financial cost of this whole event, rather than the environmental damage.

You're also forgetting that taxpayers shouldn't have to be paying for the cleanup AT ALL. I say BP should foot the ENTIRE bill. They screwed up, they should fix it. (It won't happen, but we can dream...) Plus, you can bet your boots that if the Government cracks down on them HARD, other oil companies would get their act together in a hurry.

As for the environmental damage, you CANNOT put a price tag on fixing that... Heck, we're not going to know the extent of the damage for YEARS after the fact and there's going to be little that can be done... (And I hate to say this, but since the crap hit that stream, it's no longer JUST the US's problem...)

Quote from: Drayco84 on May 28, 2010, 11:21:48 PM

Quote from: Shachza on May 28, 2010, 08:13:52 PM
BP currently has to pay only $75 million of the estimated $14 billion that would be needed to clean everything up.  This estimated amount for cleanup is likely much larger by now since the article is nearly a month old, but BP's payment remains the same.

It gets worse...
I'm just double-checking out the Valdez in Wikipedia, but they were sued for $5 billion in punitive damages, only to have that get reduced to 75% of $507.5 mil. (Although they did get hit with "late fees" of $480 mil in 2009. Yeah, bastards still haven't paid it. It's not like the money isn't there...)

Out of approx. 53.1 million gallons of oil the Valdez was carrying, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says there's still around 26 thousand gallons of oil still in Alaska's soil.

But, as for how it really gets worse? They'll just jump up gas prices to recoup any and all fines they get.

Oh, and Consumerist is keeping up on the news: http://consumerist.com/2010/05/bp-oil-spill-more-like-12-19000-barrels-per-day.html (http://consumerist.com/2010/05/bp-oil-spill-more-like-12-19000-barrels-per-day.html)

Quote from: Turnsky on May 28, 2010, 11:00:11 PM
Folks are also forgetting that while taxes are a pain in the arse, being smited for the full amount of the cleanup would likely cause more problems than good.
It's also worth noting that people are complaining more about the financial cost of this whole event, rather than the environmental damage.

You're also forgetting that taxpayers shouldn't have to be paying for the cleanup AT ALL. I say BP should foot the ENTIRE bill. They screwed up, they should fix it. (It won't happen, but we can dream...) Plus, you can bet your boots that if the Government cracks down on them HARD, other oil companies would get their act together in a hurry.

As for the environmental damage, you CANNOT put a price tag on fixing that... Heck, we're not going to know the extent of the damage for YEARS after the fact and there's going to be little that can be done... (And I hate to say this, but since the crap hit that stream, it's no longer JUST the US's problem...)

yet if they foot the entire bill and go bankrupt as a result of this, that could set the stage for company collapse, which in turn would result in the loss of jobs of lots of people, even those not remotely associated with the company at all.. yes i do realise that 14 bil would be a pittance to a global company like british petroleum (BP), but take into consideration the sheer ramifications of a large global company collapse.

i'm not against them paying their fair share, but people are already paying for it in more ways than you can think.

Quote from: Turnsky on May 29, 2010, 12:31:34 AM

yet if they foot the entire bill and go bankrupt as a result of this, that could set the stage for company collapse, which in turn would result in the loss of jobs of lots of people, even those not remotely associated with the company at all.. yes i do realise that 14 bil would be a pittance to a global company like british petroleum (BP), but take into consideration the sheer ramifications of a large global company collapse.

i'm not against them paying their fair share, but people are already paying for it in more ways than you can think.

Actually, they have insurance against this sort of thing. It's the insurance company they went with that would foot the bulk of the bill. And to be frank, if they cannot afford to fix any problems that might happen as a result of this stuff, why should we let them try it in the first place?

Quote from: Turnsky on May 29, 2010, 12:31:34 AM
Yet if they foot the entire bill and go bankrupt as a result of this, that could set the stage for company collapse, which in turn would result in the loss of jobs of lots of people, even those not remotely associated with the company at all.. yes i do realise that 14 bil would be a pittance to a global company like british petroleum (BP), but take into consideration the sheer ramifications of a large global company collapse.

Quote from: Shachza on May 28, 2010, 08:13:52 PM
BP currently has to pay only $75 million of the estimated $14 billion that would be needed to clean everything up.  This estimated amount for cleanup is likely much larger by now since the article is nearly a month old, but BP's payment remains the same.

This is from Wikipedia. And mind you, this is REPORTED earnings... (BP is in the middle, the green box.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Big_Oil.svg (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Big_Oil.svg)
If they need to, "borrow" some from this guy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T._Boone_Pickens).

And yes, I'm aware that BP is putting money into researching alternative energy sources.

okay, so i have no idea how economies work.. but i do know that if folks don't shush and foot the cost and just get it done already, things are gonna get worse.

worry about 'compensation' later.

In courts.


where other people's livelihoods are endangered by an unholy amount of raw crude.

Quote from: Turnsky on May 29, 2010, 04:40:29 AM
okay, so i have no idea how economies work.. but i do know that if folks don't shush and foot the cost and just get it done already, things are gonna get worse.

worry about 'compensation' later.

In courts.


where other people's livelihoods are endangered by an unholy amount of raw crude.

I'm afraid this isn't likely. The area in question is out in the middle of the ocean, and not technically within any one country's borders. With no clear jurisdiction however, it means that BP doesn't really have to answer to anyone, save their customers. A US court wouldn't likely have the authority to take any direct legal actions against BP. It also means that US regulations would not apply there either. There really aren't any government regulations that exist on an international level, so there is no court that BP could be taken to with a clear case to be made over this incident.

This, in essence, means that BP can do whatever they want with the area, and they don't have to be responsible for cleaning up after themselves. The only place they can be hurt is in their wallet, and customers aren't likely to stop buying their oil just because of this incident (though some may). I suppose it's cheaper for them to do minimal cleanup and to cut costs wherever they can on drilling, they don't have to pay the price when disaster strikes. They're a business, and they'll take whatever path leads them to gaining the most profit.

Quote from: Alondro on May 27, 2010, 02:35:56 PM
After this spill, I don't think anyone can dispute that deep-water drilling is higher prone to accidents getting out of control more easily than land or shallow water wells.

Um... so what? The reason that BP is blowing billions of dollars developing wells a mile underwater is that there isn't much in way of safer alternatives to explore. Most of the easily accessed wells have already been tapped, and most of those are fast being depleted to the point where it's no longer economical to suck out what's left.

If you're an oil company worried about your dwindling reserves, your options aren't very attractive.

a) Shlock through tons of sand or shale to squeeze out a few drops of bitumen/kerogen that must be (expensively) processed into useable crude.
b) Drill deep holes in the middle of the ocean that risk destroying Lousiana if you fuck up. Oh, and you might lose your rig in the next hurricane anyway, so pump fast!
c) Convince governments to let you dig up protected nature reserves. Endangered species don't need all that oil anyway.
d) Developed undertapped reserves in areas of high geopolitical instability where your billion dollar investments might be arbitrarily nationalized, threatened by dangerous militants, or worse... :dface
e) Give up on silly things cars, plastics, large scale agriculture, capitalism, and the like. Go hug more trees and hope the planet will forgive you even if your shareholders don't.

The only one oil companies don't seem to be trying is e). Go figure. :3

Ultimately, the question is still: Do you want/need the oil or not? It's fast becoming obvious that global oil production has already peaked. The safe/cheap/easy/clean stuff is going fast, if not already long gone...

Quote from: superluser on May 28, 2010, 11:51:42 AM
Edit: Wow.  There really is a company called Sinopec.

It's actually the China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation. Sinopec is one of the largest corporations in the world (9th by revenues on the Fortune Global 500 last year). Expect that to grow drastically now that the Chinese government is relaxing its price controls over the energy industry. Given the growth the the Chinese automobile industry, it might be bigger than Walmart soon...

Quote from: The1Kobra on May 29, 2010, 09:44:33 AM
I'm afraid this isn't likely. The area in question is out in the middle of the ocean, and not technically within any one country's borders. With no clear jurisdiction however, it means that BP doesn't really have to answer to anyone, save their customers.

Incorrect. Although outside of US sovereign territory proper, the Deepwater Horizon platform is positioned well within the American EEZ, not in international waters. The United States has considerable control over what goes on in there, and the damage from the spill has most definitely made its way to US soil where jurisdiction issues are much less fuzzy.


It's possible--even likely--that this disaster will become the Three Mile Island of offshore drilling in America. It took four decades four the country to get over that and start reinvesting in nuclear technology. The administration has already suspended permits for new offshore developments. Even token efforts to wean the country off of foreign oil failed. :animesweat

Quote from: Tezkat on May 29, 2010, 12:35:00 PM
e) Give up on silly things cars, plastics, large scale agriculture, capitalism, and the like. Go hug more trees and hope the planet will forgive you even if your shareholders don't.

The only one oil companies don't seem to be trying is e). Go figure. :3

Ultimately, the question is still: Do you want/need the oil or not? It's fast becoming obvious that global oil production has already peaked. The safe/cheap/easy/clean stuff is going fast, if not already long gone...

Well, it would be nice if we could stop burning it in cars and trucks, and use electricity for that instead (say, from nuclear plants).  If they were taken out of the equation, existing reserves should go a lot further for plastics and the other things that electricity alone won't do you for.  You would probably still need it for aircraft, for instance.

Quote from: Tezkat on May 29, 2010, 12:35:00 PM

It's possible--even likely--that this disaster will become the Three Mile Island of offshore drilling in America. It took four decades four the country to get over that and start reinvesting in nuclear technology. The administration has already suspended permits for new offshore developments. Even token efforts to wean the country off of foreign oil failed.

Quote from: Reese Tora on May 28, 2010, 03:30:46 AM

The problem is corruption in the government agency that's supposed to be monitoring them (the gas that caused the explosion would have been detected and safely dealt with if a battery in the apparatus that is there to detect gas had been replaced- this is something the government is supposed to be monitoring) and BP and the company running the platform, between them, ignoring proper procedure and not replacing a valve which blew earlier (see, a problem occurred in operation, the valve blew to stop the oil from spilling, and a ton of concrete was poured to stop the leak... all routine.  then they went ahead and continued operating without replacing that valve, which might have prevented the gas buildup that caused the explosion that sank the rig.)

It was a problem with safety devices that caused Chernobyl to go too; they're still sorting it out.

In my opinion, the watchdog/agencies responsible now have a duty of care for the state and should foot the bill for any economical damage that will result.  The markets seem to have been hit harshly since the start of the leak.

Actually for Chernobyl it was
- Execution by unprepared personnel (other shift was supposed to do the test, and rehearsed it; unfortunately, due to a faulre in ANOTHER power station Chernobyl was ordered to stay operational for few more hours to provide power, and the workshift change happened)
- MISdesign of some parts of reactor - notably, control rods had graphite caps at end, which meant that reaction was actually ACCELERATED as you started to lower the rods down, and was slowed down only afterwards (So instead of a 543210 graph you had an 5676543210 one...)
- A few other things I don't remember, but not sure if failure of failsafes was there anywhere. After all, failsafes put control rods down in, and in RBMK-100 that very action could lead to explosion. (Fear not, they replaced the rods with more sane design in all other operational RBMKs).

Quote from: Eryo Gigasee on May 29, 2010, 04:21:28 PM
In my opinion, the watchdog/agencies responsible now have a duty of care for the state and should foot the bill for any economical damage that will result.  The markets seem to have been hit harshly since the start of the leak.

By "watchdog/agencies", you mean "taxpayers", right? :animesweat

I dare say some taxpayers may have a vested interest in the resolution of the problem.  I don't understand US law or economics, but I would have thought affected states would pay for some of the cleanup; at least if they wanted it to happen quickly...

At the very least, they would have to pay for a new agency, or the reconstruction of the old one.

Quote from: hapless on May 29, 2010, 08:39:20 PM
Actually for Chernobyl it was
- Execution by unprepared personnel (other shift was supposed to do the test, and rehearsed it; unfortunately, due to a faulre in ANOTHER power station Chernobyl was ordered to stay operational for few more hours to provide power, and the workshift change happened)
- MISdesign of some parts of reactor - notably, control rods had graphite caps at end, which meant that reaction was actually ACCELERATED as you started to lower the rods down, and was slowed down only afterwards (So instead of a 543210 graph you had an 5676543210 one...)
- A few other things I don't remember, but not sure if failure of failsafes was there anywhere. After all, failsafes put control rods down in, and in RBMK-100 that very action could lead to explosion. (Fear not, they replaced the rods with more sane design in all other operational RBMKs).

I was under the impression that the backup generator that powers the failsafes wasn't fast enough to prevent them going offline before core failure. At least, according to an old physics book I studied during my A-levels.  Admittedly, it took a lot to go wrong...

Quote from: Eryo Gigasee on May 30, 2010, 04:00:23 PM
I dare say some taxpayers may have a vested interest in the resolution of the problem.  I don't understand US law or economics, but I would have thought affected states would pay for some of the cleanup; at least if they wanted it to happen quickly...

At the very least, they would have to pay for a new agency, or the reconstruction of the old one.

Oh yes, I fully expect that as a US citizen I will have to pay money to get things done, and to get them done quickly.  What I find most telling is that BP will very likely have to pay a much smaller percentage for cleanup than I probably will for a disaster in which it had a direct hand.

Imagine, if you will, a guy who works at a fast food restaurant fourty hours a week for $8.00 an hour.  That's about $64.00 per day.  He has the unfortunate task of taking out the used oil and grease and disposing of it.  Instead of dealing with proper authorities this man comes to your house and dumps a week's worth of used deep fryer oil all over your house.  Just for giggles we'll say that cleaning all this up will cost $12,000.00 (or 187 times this man's daily income, which is what BP is looking at now).  Here's what happens: he only has to pay $76.00 (a little over a single day's income for him, which is also what BP is facing) while you get to pay the other $11,924.00 to clean his mess out of your house, he is never actually charged with a crime, AND that $76.00 he had to pay reduces his taxes for that year (but anything you pay won't reduce yours).

Personally I think BP should go under.  There is a long long list of people who screwed up to cause this, and the other oil drilling companies need take environmental disasters seriously.  As much as I'd love for everyone to consider the environment first, if want to get a business to pay attention fast you really need to hit their pocket books.

Quote from: Tapewolf on May 29, 2010, 02:03:17 PM

Quote from: Tezkat on May 29, 2010, 12:35:00 PM
e) Give up on silly things cars, plastics, large scale agriculture, capitalism, and the like. Go hug more trees and hope the planet will forgive you even if your shareholders don't.

The only one oil companies don't seem to be trying is e). Go figure. :3

Ultimately, the question is still: Do you want/need the oil or not? It's fast becoming obvious that global oil production has already peaked. The safe/cheap/easy/clean stuff is going fast, if not already long gone...

Well, it would be nice if we could stop burning it in cars and trucks, and use electricity for that instead (say, from nuclear plants).  If they were taken out of the equation, existing reserves should go a lot further for plastics and the other things that electricity alone won't do you for.  You would probably still need it for aircraft, for instance.

Green aircraft:  All the passengers flapping their arms really fast.   ;)

Quote from: hapless on May 29, 2010, 08:39:20 PM
Actually for Chernobyl it was
- Execution by unprepared personnel (other shift was supposed to do the test, and rehearsed it; unfortunately, due to a faulre in ANOTHER power station Chernobyl was ordered to stay operational for few more hours to provide power, and the workshift change happened)
- MISdesign of some parts of reactor - notably, control rods had graphite caps at end, which meant that reaction was actually ACCELERATED as you started to lower the rods down, and was slowed down only afterwards (So instead of a 543210 graph you had an 5676543210 one...)
- A few other things I don't remember, but not sure if failure of failsafes was there anywhere. After all, failsafes put control rods down in, and in RBMK-100 that very action could lead to explosion. (Fear not, they replaced the rods with more sane design in all other operational RBMKs).

ironically, however, while not being safe for humans the exclusion zone itself has become a veritable nature preserve and local wildlife seems to be doing quite well..

not nearly as big of an environmental disaster as it initially was back in the eighties. Just goes to show that nature does bounce back if given a chance.

I just wish we could build powerful enough magnets, that if you equipped em on a turbine and the 'GO' Position was putting the negative ends of the magnets close together, spinning a turbine.


If we had powerful enough magnets, imagine driving a car that ran off of em. XD


. . .

I wonder if that idea  has been patented yet or not :c

I believe that the problem with the Chernobyl exclusion zone is not that it is 'unsafe' for humans, rather that it is 'unsafe' for the government to allow people to stay there because everyone who gets cancer in there will blame it on the reactor and will want money.  The last figure I saw for the total cases of cancer because of Chernobyl was 1 extra radiation case per 1,000,000 people per year.  Of course, it is god damned radiation, so everyone has to be scared of it.

Plus with an operating profit of $5.6 billion in Q1Y2010[1] I don't see how they can can bankrupt from cleaning up the spill.  They are probably also going to lay some blame on Halliburton (the people who did the cementing) so they will probably take some of the cost too.  Plus, I've been poking some of the documents from the investigation by the Committee of Energy and Commerce[2] and a few documents really don't paint a pretty picture.  Mostly a picture of systemic neglect of basic safety from top to bottom.  A memo on BPs internal review[3] looks especially unpleasant, highlighting a good number of incidents in the 24 hours before the explosion.  Of course, this is all ongoing investigations, so things will change.

[1] http://www.bp.com/liveassets/bp_internet/globalbp/STAGING/global_assets/downloads/B/bp_first_quarter_2010_results.pdf
[2] http://energycommerce.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1985:energy-a-commerce-committee-investigates-deepwater-horizon-rig-oil-spill&catid=122:media-advisories
[3] http://energycommerce.house.gov/documents/20100525/Memo.BP.Internal.Investigation.pdf

Quote from: Tapewolf on May 29, 2010, 02:03:17 PM
Well, it would be nice if we could stop burning it in cars and trucks, and use electricity for that instead (say, from nuclear plants).  If they were taken out of the equation, existing reserves should go a lot further for plastics and the other things that electricity alone won't do you for.  You would probably still need it for aircraft, for instance.

Meh. You can fly a 747 on coconut oil, if so inclined. Biodiesel from algae, cellulosic ethanol, and the like are promising as a stopgap if nothing else. Not so great in terms of carbon footprints, but the problem we're addressing here is oil scarcity.

It's not as if we aren't seeing a push in the direction of greener vehicles, motivated in no small part by skyrocketing oil prices. The major automobile manufacturers will probably phase out production of non-hybrid or electric automobiles by 2020. (Some, like Toyota, have been quite public about such plans.) But let's put that in perspective. There are on the order of 260m motor vehicles currently in registered in the United States. Less than 1% of those are hybrids or electric vehicles. The average vehicle age overall is almost a decade. It'll be the better part of two decades before hybrid or electric vehicles are in the majority. By then, China and India should each have about the same number of cars on the road as there are in America now. China at least is becoming fairly aggressive about fuel economy standards of late. India... not so much. They're still partially subsidizing fuel prices. But the take home message is that, even if we continue to develop greener vehicle technologies and American oil consumption peaks, global demand for oil will be going up, not down. Global supply is not rising, and oil is becoming increasingly expensive to extract even from conventional sources. It's not surprising that companies want to get their paws on whatever new sources of oil become available. And most of that is deep undersea.

Quote from: Shachza on May 30, 2010, 08:13:29 PM
Personally I think BP should go under.  There is a long long list of people who screwed up to cause this, and the other oil drilling companies need take environmental disasters seriously.  As much as I'd love for everyone to consider the environment first, if want to get a business to pay attention fast you really need to hit their pocket books.

Heh. Total costs of $14 billion? That's how much BP made in profit for fiscal 2009. They can afford to pay that, write it off as a particularly bad year, and keep on chugging...

Admittedly, a number of people are predicting a buyout by Exxon or Shell, if you want to take that as a consolation prize... :3

Quote from: Drathorin on May 31, 2010, 08:26:24 AM
I just wish we could build powerful enough magnets, that if you equipped em on a turbine and the 'GO' Position was putting the negative ends of the magnets close together, spinning a turbine.


If we had powerful enough magnets, imagine driving a car that ran off of em. XD


. . .

I wonder if that idea  has been patented yet or not :c

It's called an electric motor--first patented back in the 1830s. :animesweat

....

Well why don't we just make the magnets huge and run off of that? Limitless power! Mwahahahaha

One idea kicked around in early 2000 was the use of large, frictionless flywheels to capture excess energy for storage.  While it worked in concept, to build such flywheels AND keep them frictionless proved exceedingly difficult and crushingly expensive.

http://tinyurl.com/252ze5a

but hey, that's business for you. Looks like i may be at least partially right after all in saying this whole deal has the potential to sink BP.

Quote from: Drathorin on May 31, 2010, 10:06:37 PM
....

Well why don't we just make the magnets huge and run off of that? Limitless power! Mwahahahaha

What I think you are talking about is the so-called "magnet motor". This device has been designed and redesigned by crackpots and the "free energy"/"perpetual-motion" people. Whether it works or not... who knows - it all depends on who you ask. Either it simply doesn't work, and cant, or it actually -does- work, but the magnets get drained over time(essentially it ends up using the magnets as a "battery" of a sort - the energy being put in when it was made).
If this device is A, possible and B, can be made reliably, it would solve a -lot- of problems. Unfortunately, I don't see them powering cars yet.

On the subject of electric vehicles, personally I'm not so sure about them. Mainly because of battery technology.
Currently the best thing we have is Lithium-ion-type batteries. They may have a fairly nice storage to weight/volume ratio... but they are also A, full of toxic lithium, B, require highly-precise charging mechanisms, and C, lose capacity with age.
If we -did- have everyone driving electric cars, while it might mean less oil used, there would probably be as much if not more impact from all the lithium batteries being produced... and then recycled and produced again every few years as they age beyond usability.
But, even ignoring that... I -really- don't want to see what happens when two cars - full of lithium batteries - hit each other at 60mph, as -will- happen.
There would be a good chance of something lighting the lithium on fire, either through tearing a hole in the battery case, or shorting the cells together... and when you have enough cells to power a -car-...

So yea. Until we come up with a good, safe battery to use in these vehicles, I'm not sure I want too many of them on the road.

-Rob

Quote from: RobbieThe1st on June 02, 2010, 05:59:31 AM
What I think you are talking about is the so-called "magnet motor". This device has been designed and redesigned by crackpots and the "free energy"/"perpetual-motion" people. Whether it works or not... who knows - it all depends on who you ask. Either it simply doesn't work, and cant, or it actually -does- work, but the magnets get drained over time(essentially it ends up using the magnets as a "battery" of a sort - the energy being put in when it was made).
If this device is A, possible and B, can be made reliably, it would solve a -lot- of problems. Unfortunately, I don't see them powering cars yet.

Yeah, I came up with that idea when I was a kid.  I figured that if you could get a material that shielded magnetism you could build a rotating shutter mechanism that allowed it to keep spinning, similar to what happens in an electric motor where the poles are switched electronically, only in my case you'd be using the inertia to keep it turning until it came in range of the next pole.  It would probably require a starting turn to get it running.

I still think it would work, but it would leach away the magnetism from the poles (which I suspected at the time) and now that I think about it, it would almost certainly magnetize the rotor.  So it certainly wouldn't keep running indefinitely, and you probably wouldn't get a huge amount of torque out of it.

QuoteOn the subject of electric vehicles, personally I'm not so sure about them. Mainly because of battery technology.
...
So yea. Until we come up with a good, safe battery to use in these vehicles, I'm not sure I want too many of them on the road.

How about fuel cells?

let us not forget, that Oil does not necessarily mean "just fossil fuels", if you have a look at the petrochemical industry as a whole, you'll quickly learn that it also includes practically every single item that's constructed out of plastic, plastic coatings, and other numerous blends.

you need only to look around you, even at your keyboards and monitors to realize that fact. it just so happens that transport is only the larger part of the petrochemical equation, and folks tend to fail to look at the larger picture... even environmentalists.

Quote from: Turnsky on June 02, 2010, 07:00:57 AM
let us not forget, that Oil does not necessarily mean "just fossil fuels", if you have a look at the petrochemical industry as a whole, you'll quickly learn that it also includes practically every single item that's constructed out of plastic, plastic coatings, and other numerous blends.

Actually, that's what I was saying earlier.  If we were to stop wasting it as fuel, there would be considerably less pressure on supplies for plastics and other more subtle uses.

Quote from: RobbieThe1st on June 02, 2010, 05:59:31 AM
On the subject of electric vehicles, personally I'm not so sure about them. Mainly because of battery technology.
Currently the best thing we have is Lithium-ion-type batteries. They may have a fairly nice storage to weight/volume ratio... but they are also A, full of toxic lithium, B, require highly-precise charging mechanisms, and C, lose capacity with age.
If we -did- have everyone driving electric cars, while it might mean less oil used, there would probably be as much if not more impact from all the lithium batteries being produced... and then recycled and produced again every few years as they age beyond usability.
But, even ignoring that... I -really- don't want to see what happens when two cars - full of lithium batteries - hit each other at 60mph, as -will- happen.
There would be a good chance of something lighting the lithium on fire, either through tearing a hole in the battery case, or shorting the cells together... and when you have enough cells to power a -car-...

So yea. Until we come up with a good, safe battery to use in these vehicles, I'm not sure I want too many of them on the road.

Of course! What kind of idiot would risk their lives in a vehicle with an energy dense,  potentially flammable--even explosive--power source? Oh, wait... >:]


To be fair, there have been some fairly impressive innovations in lithium battery technology over the last several years. By the time electric vehicles see wide scale adoption, the technology should be mature enough to address most of the current concerns over safety, range, and longevity.

Quote from: Turnsky on June 02, 2010, 07:00:57 AM
let us not forget, that Oil does not necessarily mean "just fossil fuels", if you have a look at the petrochemical industry as a whole, you'll quickly learn that it also includes practically every single item that's constructed out of plastic, plastic coatings, and other numerous blends.

you need only to look around you, even at your keyboards and monitors to realize that fact. it just so happens that transport is only the larger part of the petrochemical equation, and folks tend to fail to look at the larger picture... even environmentalists.

Oooh! Don't forget agriculture, either. Fertilizers, pesticides, etc. are all produced from fossil fuels (mainly oil). Industrial agriculture uses more oil for fertilizer than any other aspect of production (e.g. machinery, irrigation, etc.). Eliminating modern, petrochemical based fertilizers would drop crop production to a fraction of current levels. We're already seeing this happening in poorer places unable to cope with the massive spike in the price of oil--and thus fertilizers. And in places like North Korea where political issues (most notably the collapse of the USSR and its oil supply) absolutely decimated agricultural production due to lack of fertilizers.

Oil scarcity potentially leads not just to less people driving SUVs, but to starvation on a large scale. :dface

Quote from: Tapewolf on June 02, 2010, 07:30:01 AM
Actually, that's what I was saying earlier.  If we were to stop wasting it as fuel, there would be considerably less pressure on supplies for plastics and other more subtle uses.

Ah... but can we pull something like that off soon enough to matter? Even converting most vehicles over to hybrid power, let alone pure electric, is something that will happen on a scale of decades, not years. Solar panels still aren't that cheap or efficient. People whine that wind farms give them headaches. We seem to be long past peak uranium. Cities are sprawling messes, designed around the notion that we'd have cheap oil and big cars forever. Places close to work are often not very nice places to live. Large public works projects like urban rail systems can take a decade build. The system is practically designed to waste oil as fuel.

And in the meantime... what? Populations are still growing. Countries are still growing. Or trying to, at least. Given that any economy that wants to grow needs access to energy supplies that--let's face it--are no longer sufficiently plentiful to go around, recession is pretty much the only thing that can keep oil demand in check. And as all those nice big oil fields continue to deplete, even economic suffering won't be effective for long. I doubt that very many players in the energy industry seriously believe that we're still on the happy side of the Hubbert curve.

The global economic, political, and social impacts of not having enough oil are not pretty.

And we know that there's a lot of oil buried deep under the sea. For instance, 49 million years ago, an ocean spanning carpet of Azolla plants sucked enough carbon out of the atmosphere to drop global CO2 levels by 80% and cool the planet enough to ice over both poles for perhaps the first time ever. All that yummy carbon is now sitting below the Arctic Ocean, much of it as oil. Notwithstanding the notion that putting it back into the atmosphere is probably a Bad Idea, it's sitting there for anyone with economic and political will to grab it.

Drill baby, drill? :animesweat

Quote from: Tezkat on June 02, 2010, 06:35:54 PM
All that yummy carbon is now sitting below the Arctic Ocean, much of it as oil. Notwithstanding the notion that putting it back into the atmosphere is probably a Bad Idea, it's sitting there for anyone with economic and political will to grab it.

Drill baby, drill? :animesweat

I don't see what the problem is.  The dinosaurs seemed to do quite well in a higher-CO2 environment.   :B

Oooooh, magnet power sources.  I've only ever seen one actually built.  All it was was two plastic rings one inside the other with magnets in them.  the pseudo science claim was that, since there was one magnet less in the inner ring than the outer, the imbalance would somehow make the motor turn forever and do work.  The video of it made it pretty easy to figure out how it really worked; the back of the wheel was off camera for half the video- up until it had gotten up to speed, and an electric motor was clearly audible while it was spinning up. 2+2 = they used a power tool to spin up their fake motor and then moved the camera to show that the device was free standing once the tool used to impart spin was removed.

The bottom line is, power has to come from somewhere, it cannot be created or destroyed.

Quote from: Tezkat on June 02, 2010, 06:35:54 PM
Of course! What kind of idiot would risk their lives in a vehicle with an energy dense,  potentially flammable--even explosive--power source? Oh, wait... >:]

Different levels of volatility, and gasoline has the decency to require a fairly specific ratio of fuel to air to be dangerously explosive.

Honestly, I don't think that battery powered electric cars will be viable because of charging factors.  unless you can get a battery to recieve a full charge safely in a few minutes, something else that can be quickly fueled up (hydrogen fuel cells, for instance) will be a better alternative.  You can't have a car that can only drive for four or five hours and then needs to rest and charge for the remaining time. (The Tesla roadster, the current state of the art in electric cars, has the best range that I'm aware of, and they list the best charger for their car as granting 56 miles of travel per hour of charging and a range of 250 miles per charge- assuming rest areas properly equipped with that charger, you would spend more time charging than driving on a long trip, and you can't call AAA to bring you a gallon of electricity if you break down half way between Middletown and Nowhereville)

I agree that cars that use electric motors will ultimately be the way of the future, though- something that uses a system similar to diesel-electric trains or the M1-A1 tank's turbine engine whereby a strong engine is used to produce electricity that is fed to motors- this can be finely controlled to improve fuel efficiency and give better traction during turns or on slippery roads, would reduce the number of moving parts in a car like the very expensive to replace transmission, and may even include a small battery that can store a little extra electricity through regenerative breaking(as with the Prius) to reduce fuel consumption later.

oh, right, oil spill... pollution bad, government and corporate corruption bad, grr...

Did you know, the government agency that was supposed to be auditing BP's platform approved today another off shore drilling platform off the coast of Louisiana?  This one is going to be in only 100 feet of water, though, not the several thousand feet that is currently stymieing efforts to stop the spill of oil from Deep Horizon's pipe.

Shame there's no way to convert that excess population into oil...

If someone could get a working black powder motor then that could potentially solve some applications.  That said, the Mythbusters failed to, and I'm betting the only way to do it would involve mixing it with oil, like a small rocket engine.

Additional good news:  BP represents 8% of British state pensions.  Considering my local council lost £50000 to a certain Icelandic bank last year you'd have thought they'd check their investments.

Alll I can say is that if BP doesn't get off their bums and solve the problem, much of the fishing industry in the gulf is going to be out of business (can't sell tainted fish). Also, if the gulf keeps filling up with oil, the Gulf of Mexico might as well be renamed "The Oil Ocean Zone".

Quote from: KarlOmega1 on June 03, 2010, 06:30:05 PM
Alll I can say is that if BP doesn't get off their bums [snip]

It's not like they aren't making an effort to stop the leak.  You can only do so much at one time.

Note that they have finished cutting away the damaged part of the pipe and are now in the process of putting a temporary cap on it. (unless they have finished or failed by this time, which I doubt since I heard a news report about the cutting being completed just two hours ago as of this posting.)

Quote from: Eryo Gigasee on June 03, 2010, 02:43:15 PM
Shame there's no way to convert that excess population into oil...

If someone could get a working black powder motor then that could potentially solve some applications.  That said, the Mythbusters failed to, and I'm betting the only way to do it would involve mixing it with oil, like a small rocket engine.

Additional good news:  BP represents 8% of British state pensions.  Considering my local council lost £50000 to a certain Icelandic bank last year you'd have thought they'd check their investments.

Mythbusters isn't exactly the pinnacle of science or engineering :o

Quote from: KarlOmega1 on June 03, 2010, 06:30:05 PM
Alll I can say is that if BP doesn't get off their bums and solve the problem, much of the fishing industry in the gulf is going to be out of business (can't sell tainted fish). Also, if the gulf keeps filling up with oil, the Gulf of Mexico might as well be renamed "The Oil Ocean Zone".

It will, which is my concern here.  My state's economy is based in part on the independence of our fishing industry, most notably the oysters, crabs, shrimp, and crawfish portions, all of which is or can be seriously affected by all this.  We're already seeing price hikes in oysters due to the closures of the oyster beds.  Almost half of the beds have already been closed.  :<

http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2010/06/eepybirds-coke-mentos-rocket-car/

coke and mentos, the way of the future   :U

Quote from: Tapewolf on June 02, 2010, 06:40:04 AM

Quote from: RobbieThe1st on June 02, 2010, 05:59:31 AM
What I think you are talking about is the so-called "magnet motor". This device has been designed and redesigned by crackpots and the "free energy"/"perpetual-motion" people. Whether it works or not... who knows - it all depends on who you ask. Either it simply doesn't work, and cant, or it actually -does- work, but the magnets get drained over time(essentially it ends up using the magnets as a "battery" of a sort - the energy being put in when it was made).
If this device is A, possible and B, can be made reliably, it would solve a -lot- of problems. Unfortunately, I don't see them powering cars yet.

Yeah, I came up with that idea when I was a kid.  I figured that if you could get a material that shielded magnetism you could build a rotating shutter mechanism that allowed it to keep spinning, similar to what happens in an electric motor where the poles are switched electronically, only in my case you'd be using the inertia to keep it turning until it came in range of the next pole.  It would probably require a starting turn to get it running.

I still think it would work, but it would leach away the magnetism from the poles (which I suspected at the time) and now that I think about it, it would almost certainly magnetize the rotor.  So it certainly wouldn't keep running indefinitely, and you probably wouldn't get a huge amount of torque out of it.

I don't think so.
Magnetism of a material is caused by domain allignment.
Other forces acting on it can mess up the domains, but this is completely analogous to a common engine operating
I think that either the "magnetic shield material" would be active (as in active components, meaning it would consume energy to operate) or it would get magnetised over time... not to mention i cannot think of how could it actually work

Quote from: danman on June 04, 2010, 04:19:12 PM
I don't think so.
Magnetism of a material is caused by domain allignment.
Other forces acting on it can mess up the domains, but this is completely analogous to a common engine operating

I'm not sure I follow.  Is there a bit missing?

QuoteI think that either the "magnetic shield material" would be active (as in active components, meaning it would consume energy to operate) or it would get magnetised over time...

How about mu-metal?  I can imagine it losing its effectiveness over time, though.

Quotenot to mention i cannot think of how could it actually work

The motor itself, or the physics of mu-metal?  I think mu-metal works by diverting the field somehow.

The motor itself would be something like this:

(http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k216/tapewolf/scraps/magmotor.png)
http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k216/tapewolf/scraps/magmotor.png

... the shield is on a separate rotor between the outer poles and the inner poles on the armature.  It has windows cut into it - most likely more eccentric than the ones I've illustrated - and the trick is to keep it rotating just out of phase with the armature.  The idea is that as the armature poles reach the outer poles, the shield intervenes, effectively cutting off the field and allowing it to keep rotating until it starts to be attracted by the next pole.  Otherwise it would just stop.

What might be more practical is an oscillating motion where the shutter slides open and closed - you could probably use some kind of cam mechanism to control it.

Now, the question is, assuming it works at all, how much energy you'd actually get out of it.  And I suspect the answer is 'not much'.  And I still think that over time you'd end up with the poles reaching some kind of equilibrium.

It's official...

"People" are taking notice... (http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2010/6/4/)

http://jalopnik.com/5555628/bp-station-sign-is-beyond-irony

Quote from: Turnsky on June 05, 2010, 01:57:31 AM
http://jalopnik.com/5555628/bp-station-sign-is-beyond-irony

Strange... I have this sudden urge to punch a BP exec in the face...

i also found this in my travels, useful for putting things in perspective.

http://www.ifitwasmyhome.com/

I had an interesting conversation about this with a co-worker (who was just leaving on maternity leave). Apparently her other half works for BP.

Turns out, she says, that the problem was caused by an explosion; so far, nothing interesting or unexpected. That was caused by four independant safety devices all failing at the same time. No surprises there, either.

Here's the interesting bit. Those safety devices aren't used by BP anywhere outside the US, because they don't meet BP's internal safety requirements. They're used in the US because the rig wasn't run by BP, it was run by another company, and checked by Halliburton (now there's a name to remember), and the safety devices meet the US regulations. Now, BP apparently asked them to replace these with the ones that BP use, or at least ones that aren't prone to failure, and the other company (whose name I unfortunately can't remember just at the moment) declined because the ones they used "meet regulations".

Quite why BP isn't crucifying Halliburton and the other company in the press, we're not sure, but we suspect it's something to do with wanting to sue the pants off them. Either way, it's interesting that the same thing couldn't happen, or at least is much less likely to happen, anywhere else in the world but the US of A, isn't it?


Of course, this is all hearsay, but it does put a slightly different light on the situation, doesn't it?

And hearsay from BP at that ;p

I hear that the real problem is that the tech and preventer systems were okay down to a few hundred feet in the continental shelf, but not for the deep waters.  If the MMS ever allows for drilling permits again it will be interesting to see if there is a new certification program for such things.

@Tape;
Hmm, the muddled up bit was me trying to say that in this case, during operation, the permanent magnets don't experience any forces different to what they do in normal operation, so them losing magnetism is unlikely.

Second thing to think about is that a moving magnetic field makes a current (in this case eddy currents in the mu-metal) in order to generate a magnetic field opposing the original one (Law of Lenz) ... since mumetal has a rather high permeability, this effect would be probably significant...
but then you could make the core laminated...

hmm, maybe i will think of something today - after all ,electromagnetism is a part of what will be on the electricity exam on monday

Quote from: danman on June 05, 2010, 10:36:43 AM
@Tape;
Hmm, the muddled up bit was me trying to say that in this case, during operation, the permanent magnets don't experience any forces different to what they do in normal operation, so them losing magnetism is unlikely.

Well, anecdotally, horseshoe magnets invariably come with a guard linking the two poles.  I've heard that they will diminish in strength if they are left with the guard off.  Is this just a myth?
Then again, that's not really the situation that you'd get in the motor anyway, because the N and S poles I've marked would strictly be one end of a bar or cylindrical magnet.

QuoteSecond thing to think about is that a moving magnetic field makes a current (in this case eddy currents in the mu-metal) in order to generate a magnetic field opposing the original one (Law of Lenz) ... since mumetal has a rather high permeability, this effect would be probably significant...

True.

Quotehmm, maybe i will think of something today - after all ,electromagnetism is a part of what will be on the electricity exam on monday

Good luck.  If I hadn't been bitten by the computer bug, I would probably have gone into electronics or mechanical engineering myself...

Quote from: Tapewolf on June 05, 2010, 12:21:05 PM

Quote from: danman on June 05, 2010, 10:36:43 AM
@Tape;
Hmm, the muddled up bit was me trying to say that in this case, during operation, the permanent magnets don't experience any forces different to what they do in normal operation, so them losing magnetism is unlikely.

Well, anecdotally, horseshoe magnets invariably come with a guard linking the two poles.  I've heard that they will diminish in strength if they are left with the guard off.  Is this just a myth?

Hmm, i admit i have never seen a horseshoe magnet, only bars, but i suspect that what the guard does is helping to preserve the magnet by improving the flux linkage around the (made with the guard) circuit.
Uniform magnetic field cannot "break" a magnet as far as i know-  to demagnetise, you need to jumble up the domains either by beating it up or (better) sticking it into a coil with AC current, and slowly turning the voltage to 0.
Now this makes me think...if the field generated by the mumetal is strong enough , and the engine turns quickly (ignoring the fact that it would probably cause it not to ) it actually could jumble the magnet up!!  :doh

Quote
Then again, that's not really the situation that you'd get in the motor anyway, because the N and S poles I've marked would strictly be one end of a bar or cylindrical magnet.

QuoteSecond thing to think about is that a moving magnetic field makes a current (in this case eddy currents in the mu-metal) in order to generate a magnetic field opposing the original one (Law of Lenz) ... since mumetal has a rather high permeability, this effect would be probably significant...

True.

Quotehmm, maybe i will think of something today - after all ,electromagnetism is a part of what will be on the electricity exam on monday

Good luck.  If I hadn't been bitten by the computer bug, I would probably have gone into electronics or mechanical engineering myself...

Thanks... in fact that is remarkably similar to me - i actually considered applying for computer science, and programming is still the one thing i am among the better folk in the year. Only difference that instead of mechanics, i find i quite like material science.
But then , from what i hear, you were a far better programmer even at my age... the biggest single thing i wrote so far was a ncurses  sudoku game.

I think because of this disaster, we're going to see a very radical change in car design in the very near future instead of the mid- long term future we're currently looking at. (ie, the hybirds, electrics, and whatever else they are going to come up with.) 

In a way we can look at it as, we all drive cars, therefore we all need gas, therefore we need more oil, therefore, new places to drill are needed using tech that may not work right. So with the incoming changes to oil regulations (because it's inevitable at this point), we're going to need a very different approach to how we fuel our transportation.

hmm... magnet denaturing does happen, but it depends on the material that the magnet is made from.  Originally, magnets were made by heating and cooling a rod of metal while holding it inside a magnetic field (generally generated by electromagnetic force)

These would be iron or steel, and could lose strength over time- or with a hard shock (ie: dropping it or hitting something with it)

cheap magnets as used in children's toys will likely be ferrite magnets (I had lots of these as a kid) because they are very cheap to make and strength isn't really important.

More modern permanent magnets used where performance is an issue are rare earth magnets (neodymium is the most common type used today.)

A quick search through Wikipedia shows that rare earth magnets can lose strength if they are heated beyond a certain point(dependent on material)

further reading:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare-earth_magnet
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permanent_magnet

Quote from: Reese Tora on June 03, 2010, 03:46:46 AM
Honestly, I don't think that battery powered electric cars will be viable because of charging factors.  unless you can get a battery to recieve a full charge safely in a few minutes, something else that can be quickly fueled up (hydrogen fuel cells, for instance) will be a better alternative.  You can't have a car that can only drive for four or five hours and then needs to rest and charge for the remaining time. (The Tesla roadster, the current state of the art in electric cars, has the best range that I'm aware of, and they list the best charger for their car as granting 56 miles of travel per hour of charging and a range of 250 miles per charge- assuming rest areas properly equipped with that charger, you would spend more time charging than driving on a long trip, and you can't call AAA to bring you a gallon of electricity if you break down half way between Middletown and Nowhereville)

Actually, I've heard of batteries from Toshiba under development that have a charge time of ~5 min.

http://www.ev.com/ev-guides/ev-miscellaneous/toshibas-breakthrough-ev-battery-charges-in-5-minutes.html

A charge time that fast would put batteries in the same league as gas for range. Out of juice? Find a station and power up. And transporting power is something we're ALREADY DOING! The infrastructure is largely already there, we just need the stations. And compared to building hydrogen transport and storage, that's easy. And it's entirely possible that AAA could help you in that instance. Just put an even larger battery on a tow/helper vehicle and juice it a bit. That kind of thing is entirely possible, just needs to be built.

Quote from: Cvstos on June 06, 2010, 08:44:58 PM
Actually, I've heard of batteries from Toshiba under development that have a charge time of ~5 min.
http://www.ev.com/ev-guides/ev-miscellaneous/toshibas-breakthrough-ev-battery-charges-in-5-minutes.html

Wouldn't that require a stupendous amount of current?

EDIT:

I take that back, it looks like it will work from a domestic supply:
http://www.scib.jp/en/product/spec.htm

Heh. That's a 48 Wh battery. One of those is enough to move a car... oh... a few hundred meters. :animesweat

A Tesla Roadster, to use the example cited above, stores about 53 kWh on a full charge. Charging efficiency is around 86%. The average American household uses about 29 kWh of electricity per day. In other words, two days worth of electrical power for a typical household go into a single "tank". If you want to fully charge that thing in a few minutes, you're looking at something on the order of a megawatt of power draw.

That's a lot of power. :dface

(For reference, most nuclear reactors produce less than 1000 MWe. Conventional plants only produce a few hundred. Charging enough cars simultaneously will quickly saturate production capacity.)

Even slower overnight charging has the potential to blow transformers left and right if people adopt electric cars faster than utility companies upgrade electrical grids. For that matter, given the massive costs of the power consumed charging electric cars, we'd need a much smarter grid. Even if the cars have adapters to charge from a standard plug... who pays to charge a car from an outlet at work? At a motel? In a parking garage?

We don't have the infrastructure to support a wide scale transition to electrical vehicles... yet.

Quote from: Tezkat on June 07, 2010, 07:54:38 AM
Heh. That's a 48 Wh battery. One of those is enough to move a car... oh... a few hundred meters. :animesweat

Heh. Given it's Toshiba, I suspect they're looking more at laptop use. And a laptop has, what, 4.8Wh battery? Having a laptop that you can use for two days, and plug it in for 5 minutes? I'd pay for one of those.


.. 'course, probably weighs a ton, but you get that. ;-]

Quote from: llearch n'n'daCorna on June 07, 2010, 08:09:08 AM

Quote from: Tezkat on June 07, 2010, 07:54:38 AM
Heh. That's a 48 Wh battery. One of those is enough to move a car... oh... a few hundred meters. :animesweat

Heh. Given it's Toshiba, I suspect they're looking more at laptop use. And a laptop has, what, 4.8Wh battery? Having a laptop that you can use for two days, and plug it in for 5 minutes? I'd pay for one of those.


.. 'course, probably weighs a ton, but you get that. ;-]

so back to the days of laptop's past, then?.  >:3

Quote from: Tezkat on June 07, 2010, 07:54:38 AM
Heh. That's a 48 Wh battery. One of those is enough to move a car... oh... a few hundred meters. :animesweat

Quite right, I evidently missed a couple of digits.  Realistically you'd probably have a bank of these, but then you'd be back to square one with the time or energy requirements.

Quote from: Tezkat on June 07, 2010, 07:54:38 AM
Heh. That's a 48 Wh battery. One of those is enough to move a car... oh... a few hundred meters. :animesweat

A Tesla Roadster, to use the example cited above, stores about 53 kWh on a full charge. Charging efficiency is around 86%. The average American household uses about 29 kWh of electricity per day. In other words, two days worth of electrical power for a typical household go into a single "tank". If you want to fully charge that thing in a few minutes, you're looking at something on the order of a megawatt of power draw.

That's a lot of power. :dface

(For reference, most nuclear reactors produce less than 1000 MWe. Conventional plants only produce a few hundred. Charging enough cars simultaneously will quickly saturate production capacity.)

Even slower overnight charging has the potential to blow transformers left and right if people adopt electric cars faster than utility companies upgrade electrical grids. For that matter, given the massive costs of the power consumed charging electric cars, we'd need a much smarter grid. Even if the cars have adapters to charge from a standard plug... who pays to charge a car from an outlet at work? At a motel? In a parking garage?

We don't have the infrastructure to support a wide scale transition to electrical vehicles... yet.

Where do you see the 48 Wh? I don't see it in my link. And Toshiba is definitely targeting these for EV use. http://www.electronista.com/articles/07/12/11/toshiba.scib.battery/

But they're also making them for other things, which tells me the tech can probably scale.

Quote from: Cvstos on June 08, 2010, 12:49:13 AM
Where do you see the 48 Wh? I don't see it in my link. And Toshiba is definitely targeting these for EV use. http://www.electronista.com/articles/07/12/11/toshiba.scib.battery/

But they're also making them for other things, which tells me the tech can probably scale.

Your article describes Toshiba's SCiB technology, which has stats posted on their web site (http://www.toshiba.com/ind/product_display.jsp?id1=821). A single cell is rated at slightly over 10 Wh. The 12V 5-pack weighs 1kg and has a nominal capacity of 48 Wh.

An individual cell can charge to full in 10 minutes or so. That will power something like a laptop all day. A car? That much juice will move it less than a city block. While you can,  in theory, charge an arbitrarily large bank of these cells in parallel, the power requirements quickly become ridiculous. And that's assuming that you could even accomplish it safely.

A 53 kWh Tesla Roadster with 86% charge efficiency needs 740 kW over 10 minutes to charge to full from empty. That's several orders of magnitude larger than residential systems can produce, so our hypothetical fast charging car would need specialized recharging facilities. Wander over to your local gas station. Count the cars going in and out. Electric "gas" stations designed to handle such a load would have power requirements comparable to a particle accelerator.

The barrier here isn't technology; it's physics. Maybe you can raise the efficiency of the charging mechanism or the motor or the wheels. Naturally, those are important, but they're nickles and dimes on this scale. Even at 100% efficiency, a purely electric vehicle with both range and refueling characteristics comparable to gasoline engines just isn't practical. Ultimately, technology can only take us so far. It's the expectations and behaviour of the users that must change to take us the rest of the way.

Quote from: Tezkat on June 08, 2010, 02:29:36 AM
A 53 kWh Tesla Roadster with 86% charge efficiency needs 740 kW over 10 minutes to charge to full from empty. That's several orders of magnitude larger than residential systems can produce, so our hypothetical fast charging car would need specialized recharging facilities. Wander over to your local gas station. Count the cars going in and out. Electric "gas" stations designed to handle such a load would have power requirements comparable to a particle accelerator.

Not wishing to rain on your parade, here, and definitely not disagreeing with your point...

... but how much of the power in a Tesla Roadster is required to haul the huge bank of batteries around? How much does 53 kWh of Tesla Roadster batteries weigh? How much does 53kWh of these new Toshiba batteries weigh?

I may well be barking up the wrong tree, here, but making the car weigh less is going to have a huge improvement in the efficiency... I just have no idea if that's enough to offset the other points you raise.


... and the mental image of a "gas" station that has a nuclear power station out back for itself amuses the heck out of me... ;-]

Quote from: llearch n'n'daCorna on June 08, 2010, 05:24:34 AM
... and the mental image of a "gas" station that has a nuclear power station out back for itself amuses the heck out of me... ;-]

Conveniently enough, Toshiba also make pebble-bed reactors...

I hate to say this guys, but electric cars have been done. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_EV1)

EDIT: Although, I'm seriously surprised that nobody's mentioned it yet...

Quote from: Drayco84 on June 08, 2010, 10:36:55 AM
I hate to say this guys, but electric cars have been done. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_EV1)

EDIT: Although, I'm seriously surprised that nobody's mentioned it yet...

That's not really a good example, because it died due to market forces at the time, poor advertising, and limited capabilities due to available tech at the time of design. (no, I don't buy in to the claims that GM deliberately sank the project)

Now, there are more people receptive to the idea of electric cars and the tech is there for making it viable for a daily commute.  And advertising can always be done better, of course.

Quote from: Reese Tora on June 08, 2010, 12:57:15 PM

Quote from: Drayco84 on June 08, 2010, 10:36:55 AM
I hate to say this guys, but electric cars have been done. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_EV1)

EDIT: Although, I'm seriously surprised that nobody's mentioned it yet...

That's not really a good example, because it died due to market forces at the time, poor advertising, and limited capabilities due to available tech at the time of design. (no, I don't buy in to the claims that GM deliberately sank the project)

Now, there are more people receptive to the idea of electric cars and the tech is there for making it viable for a daily commute.  And advertising can always be done better, of course.

Of course, they have to figure out how to make an electric car that doesn't get refueled by plugging it into a wall outlet that gets its electricity power from burning highly toxic coal as opposed to an engine that burns less toxic oil....
:/

We just need more nuclear and fushion reactors :o

Or those Vertical magnetic windmills. Mass produce those suckas.

Quote from: Drathorin on June 08, 2010, 01:23:36 PM
We just need more nuclear and fushion reactors :o

Or those Vertical magnetic windmills. Mass produce those suckas.

(http://www.markshields.com/images/prop_replicas/jay_allan_mr_fusion_1.jpg)

:3

Quote from: llearch n'n'daCorna on June 08, 2010, 05:24:34 AM
Not wishing to rain on your parade, here, and definitely not disagreeing with your point...

... but how much of the power in a Tesla Roadster is required to haul the huge bank of batteries around? How much does 53 kWh of Tesla Roadster batteries weigh? How much does 53kWh of these new Toshiba batteries weigh?

I may well be barking up the wrong tree, here, but making the car weigh less is going to have a huge improvement in the efficiency... I just have no idea if that's enough to offset the other points you raise.

The Roadster has a curb weight of 1235 kg. 450kg of that is batteries. To  achieve 53 kWh with off the shelf Toshiba SCiB cells you'd need a bank of about 5300 of them--weighing in at just under 800 kg. Even if you could make batteries with significantly higher capacity per weight--and I don't doubt that that's possible--you're still going to have trouble achieving both range and refueling time parity with gasoline vehicles. A kWh is still a kWh no matter how much it weighs in battery form.

Frankly, I question how much of a market there would be for fast charging stations. With a slightly smarter grid, you could reasonably plug in a car any place you park. The Roadster already has a range of about 350 km. How many people really need to drive more than that in one sitting? And would they still be doing it even in gas vehicles once oil prices return to double their current values... or more?

Quote from: Reese Tora on June 08, 2010, 12:57:15 PM

Quote from: Drayco84 on June 08, 2010, 10:36:55 AM
I hate to say this guys, but electric cars have been done. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_EV1)

EDIT: Although, I'm seriously surprised that nobody's mentioned it yet...

That's not really a good example, because it died due to market forces at the time, poor advertising, and limited capabilities due to available tech at the time of design. (no, I don't buy in to the claims that GM deliberately sank the project)

Now, there are more people receptive to the idea of electric cars and the tech is there for making it viable for a daily commute.  And advertising can always be done better, of course.

Oh, electric vehicles still face a lot of challenges...

For instance, the ZENN (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZENN) was a kinda neat city car--an example of the direction electric vehicles might be going in the future. Rather than try to create a plug in replacement for gasoline vehicles, they distilled city driving down to the essentials: 40 kph, range upwards of 80km, and dirt cheap to build and operate (MSRP as low as $12k). It used inexpensive 6.2 kWh lead-acid batteries and could be quick charged in 5 minutes with specialized equipment. (A standard 110 V plug would fully charge it in 4 hours.)

So they had this cool little car that a lot of people wanted to buy... but they couldn't sell it in Canada (where they were manufactured) because the government refused to approve it despite the fact that it met all appropriate safety regulations. After years of stalling, certification magically appeared within weeks of a CBC National report about it. And even then, provincial regulations are such that you still can't drive it on most Canadian roads.

The last ZENN car rolled off the production line a few months ago. Even in this day and age, people are willing and able to kill the electric car.

Quote from: Tezkat on June 08, 2010, 02:34:18 PM
Frankly, I question how much of a market there would be for fast charging stations. With a slightly smarter grid, you could reasonably plug in a car any place you park. The Roadster already has a range of about 350 km. How many people really need to drive more than that in one sitting? And would they still be doing it even in gas vehicles once oil prices return to double their current values... or more?

To be honest, it depends on how far their commute to work or school is. In places that are more compact, such as most European countries, you'd be able to get a lot more use out of them. Heck, even in the States a lot of people could use at least one of these things. (Seeing as how most families in the states have two or more cars anyway...)

Quote from: Reese Tora on June 08, 2010, 12:57:15 PM
Oh, electric vehicles still face a lot of challenges...

For instance, the ZENN (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZENN) was a kinda neat city car--an example of the direction electric vehicles might be going in the future. Rather than try to create a plug in replacement for gasoline vehicles, they distilled city driving down to the essentials: 40 kph, range upwards of 80km, and dirt cheap to build and operate (MSRP as low as $12k). It used inexpensive 6.2 kWh lead-acid batteries and could be quick charged in 5 minutes with specialized equipment. (A standard 110 V plug would fully charge it in 4 hours.)

So they had this cool little car that a lot of people wanted to buy... but they couldn't sell it in Canada (where they were manufactured) because the government refused to approve it despite the fact that it met all appropriate safety regulations. After years of stalling, certification magically appeared within weeks of a CBC National report about it. And even then, provincial regulations are such that you still can't drive it on most Canadian roads.

The last ZENN car rolled off the production line a few months ago. Even in this day and age, people are willing and able to kill the electric car.

Wow... Just... Wow... I've come to expect that kind of BS from the US government, (Where I live, BTW.) but that... Just... Wow...

Anyway, one last link I've heard about (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_conversion_process) and then I'm done.

Quote from: Tezkat on June 08, 2010, 02:34:18 PM
Frankly, I question how much of a market there would be for fast charging stations. With a slightly smarter grid, you could reasonably plug in a car any place you park. The Roadster already has a range of about 350 km. How many people really need to drive more than that in one sitting? And would they still be doing it even in gas vehicles once oil prices return to double their current values... or more?

Lots of people.  Transportation of goods aside (everything from big rigs to delivery trucks), you have people who regularly commute between two locations(say, LA and Sacremento) on a weekly or monthly basis, professionals such as technicians and other professionals...

My company is in the business of testing cell networks.  Our technicians can spend up to 8 hours at a time driving around in market.  They don't have the luxury of stopping to charge in the middle of the job because we often have tight time tables for our work. (for instance, driving a base line before modifications are made and testing afterwards has to fit inside of maintenance windows).  we need to keep our guys up and running, some times in remote areas.

A friend of mine is an inspector for a construction company.  He often has to drive long distances across his state to get to a job site, and is expected to be on time for things like concrete pours.

In addition, anyone who is driving cross country for, say, a vacation would want this capacity, as you might end up needing to refuel three or four times a day in an 8 hour drive.

No, the average commuter doesn't travel more than 30 miles a day, but when you're talking about radical shifts in the country's infrastructure you need to take in to account everything, not just what you see.

Yeah, electric cars are cool technology and all, but they're not quite ready to completely replace the fossile fuel variety just yet.

New technologies are being devised to make them more usable, such as coils in the road that recharge the car while it's driving through the magic of induction, and cars where you simply replace an empty battery for a full one each time it's depleted, but overall it's not yet practial.

I can see how small electric vehicles can be very usefull inside city limits and other small errands, though.
Just create a small, light-weight 1 or 2 person car with solar cells on its roof for cheaper recharging, and use it to do your groceries. Just don't try to use it on the freeway.

Quote from: Vidar on June 11, 2010, 07:52:03 AM
Yeah, electric cars are cool technology and all, but they're not quite ready to completely replace the fossile fuel variety just yet.

New technologies are being devised to make them more usable, such as coils in the road that recharge the car while it's driving through the magic of induction, and cars where you simply replace an empty battery for a full one each time it's depleted, but overall it's not yet practial.

I can see how small electric vehicles can be very usefull inside city limits and other small errands, though.
Just create a small, light-weight 1 or 2 person car with solar cells on its roof for cheaper recharging, and use it to do your groceries. Just don't try to use it on the freeway.

really Toyota's got the right idea for the moment with the Hybrids, (Prius and now the new Hybrid variant of the Camry). that'll help improve batteries and the other electrical systems for a full electric vehicle to be a viable option later on down the road.
It's not off petroleum just yet, but it's a step in the right direction.

I'm finding out more and more how government red-tape is getting in the way of taking care of the oil spill.

Within the first few days, several nations (such as the Netherlands) offered a number of skimmers to help sweep up the oil, but were turned down.  Others offered ships to help transport equipment, and were turned down.  State governments have been bogged down and openly stymied by federal response. 

There is a law preventing international ships from moving between US ports (the 'Jones Act' section 57 of the Merchant Marine Act of 1920) which is getting in the way of the international response.  HOWEVER, this law can be suspended in times of emergency.  It was quickly suspended after Katrina to aid in supplementing oil and gas supplies, within a few days, which shows it can be done and help can be allowed to arrive quickly.  But to this day, the act has not been suspended for this disaster! 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchant_Marine_Act_of_1920

And note, the previous suspensions have all involved oil and gas, thus clear precedent exists for the act to be suspended in this case as it directly pertains to oil and gas production.  Why has it not been done?

Clearly, this entire administration has no idea what to do.

A new update.

Seafloor seep (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100719/ap_on_bi_ge/us_gulf_oil_spill)

It looks like once the relief wells are put in place, they'll have to be used to completely drain the oil formation.  If the seafloor has cracked to this extent, the only way to make sure oil doesn't gush from the underground reserve ever again is to totally empty it.