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...Lesson for Nasa! US Airmail and Aviation



 
 
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  #121  
Old May 27th 06, 01:17 AM posted to sci.space.policy,sci.space.history,sci.space.station
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On Fri, 26 May 2006 19:46:07 -0400, in a place far, far away, Alan
Anderson made the phosphor on my monitor glow
in such a way as to indicate that:

Forgive me, I'm feeling contrary today.

Fred J. McCall wrote:

The only way we would ever 'use it all up' is if there is some
critical use for which absolutely no substitute exists at any price.
Then it will stay very expensive so that price exceeds the cost of
getting it out of the ground and we'll keep pumping it up until there
is no more.

Note that the preceding is pretty much an economically impossible
situation, since there are no uses for anything that are infinitely
valuable and for which no possible substitute will do.


How about phosphorus? It's been proposed as the ultimate limiting
factor for the size of the human population the Earth will support.


Yes, well, barring some genetic mods. That are beyond current
understanding/technology...
  #122  
Old May 27th 06, 02:23 AM posted to sci.space.policy,sci.space.history,sci.space.station
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Alan Anderson wrote:

:Forgive me, I'm feeling contrary today.

Climb out on whichever frail limbs please you. :-)

:Fred J. McCall wrote:
:
: The only way we would ever 'use it all up' is if there is some
: critical use for which absolutely no substitute exists at any price.
: Then it will stay very expensive so that price exceeds the cost of
: getting it out of the ground and we'll keep pumping it up until there
: is no more.
:
: Note that the preceding is pretty much an economically impossible
: situation, since there are no uses for anything that are infinitely
: valuable and for which no possible substitute will do.
:
:How about phosphorus? It's been proposed as the ultimate limiting
:factor for the size of the human population the Earth will support.

How about phosphorus? See any danger of us running out? How ass deep
in people would we have to be before it bacame a limiting factor?

--
"Some people get lost in thought because it's such unfamiliar
territory."
--G. Behn
  #123  
Old May 27th 06, 05:16 AM posted to sci.space.policy,sci.space.history,sci.space.station
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Default ...Lesson for Nasa! US Airmail and Aviation

In article .com,
Dave O'Neill wrote:
Depends on the "office building", but if you consider the average home,
even in the relatively sun starved UK, covering the roof in PV cells
should make a typcial home a nett exporter of electricity.

The problem is currently it doesn't make economic sense for the
individual because energy is still so cheap.


The other problem is that the storage systems needed to hang onto that
energy until it's needed cost even more than the PV cells.
--
spsystems.net is temporarily off the air; | Henry Spencer
mail to henry at zoo.utoronto.ca instead. |
  #124  
Old May 27th 06, 02:46 PM posted to sci.space.policy,sci.space.history,sci.space.station
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Default ...Lesson for Nasa! US Airmail and Aviation

Hyper wrote:

Could you elaborate on that. Why is $150/barrel "ludicrous"?


Coal-to-liquids, oil shale, indirectly liquified biomass, etc.
are all competitive at prices well below that level. Even
the current price of oil is unsustainably high. The only
thing holding back investment in CTL and the like is the fear
that the price will decline before the investment in large
CTL plants can be recouped (as happened with synfuels in
the last energy 'crisis'.)

Paul

  #125  
Old May 27th 06, 02:53 PM posted to sci.space.policy,sci.space.history,sci.space.station
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Default ...Lesson for Nasa! US Airmail and Aviation

Fred J. McCall wrote:

How about phosphorus? See any danger of us running out? How ass deep
in people would we have to be before it bacame a limiting factor?


Humans don't transmute phosphorus, so of course we won't 'run out'
(unless the population of the solar system becomes so large that
the total mass of available phosphorus is inadequate to supply the
amount present in all the human bodies. This would be an enormous
population.)

What we may be forced to do is mine lower and lower grade ores,
ultimately down to the average crustal abundance (1000 ppm, IIRC).
It would also make sense to increase conservation, for example
by recycling the element from sewage and by reducing erosion,
in order to reduce the overall cost if phosphate becomes more
expensive.

Paul
  #126  
Old May 27th 06, 06:04 PM posted to sci.space.policy,sci.space.history,sci.space.station
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Paul F. Dietz wrote:

Hyper wrote:

Could you elaborate on that. Why is $150/barrel "ludicrous"?



Coal-to-liquids, oil shale, indirectly liquified biomass, etc.
are all competitive at prices well below that level.


They had an article in Newsweek- oil sands generate oil at $20 to $30
per barrel.

Pat
  #127  
Old May 27th 06, 06:22 PM posted to sci.space.policy,sci.space.history,sci.space.station
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Default ...Lesson for Nasa! US Airmail and Aviation

Pat Flannery wrote:

:They had an article in Newsweek- oil sands generate oil at $20 to $30
er barrel.

And there is a HUGE oil sands operation up in Canada. It's expanding
hugely, much to the chagrin of Canadian greens, because all by itself
it imperils Canada's adherence to Kyoto.

We buy most of the output.

--
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable
man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore,
all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
--George Bernard Shaw
  #128  
Old May 28th 06, 04:52 AM posted to sci.space.policy,sci.space.history,sci.space.station
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Default ...Lesson for Nasa! US Airmail and Aviation

Fred J. McCall wrote:
Pat Flannery wrote:

:They had an article in Newsweek- oil sands generate oil at $20 to $30
er barrel.

And there is a HUGE oil sands operation up in Canada.


Several, in fact, all located just north of Fort McMurray. (I've done
some consulting for one of them.)

It takes a fair amount of energy (and water!) to liberate the tar from
the sand, then add hydrogen to produce light crude. There is some talk
about building a nuclear reactor to supply the required power rather
than rely on ATCO.

--
Dave Michelson




  #129  
Old May 29th 06, 12:33 AM posted to sci.space.policy,sci.space.history,sci.space.station
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Default ...Lesson for Nasa! US Airmail and Aviation


Henry Spencer wrote:
In article .com,
Dave O'Neill wrote:
Depends on the "office building", but if you consider the average home,
even in the relatively sun starved UK, covering the roof in PV cells
should make a typcial home a nett exporter of electricity.

The problem is currently it doesn't make economic sense for the
individual because energy is still so cheap.


The other problem is that the storage systems needed to hang onto that
energy until it's needed cost even more than the PV cells.


Which is why the total set up is circa £20K.

There is a good argument for a subsidised system part funded for all
new builds though. Of course, the storage cells will need to be
renewed too.

Dave

  #130  
Old June 1st 06, 02:17 AM posted to sci.space.policy,sci.space.history,sci.space.station
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Default ...Lesson for Nasa! US Airmail and Aviation

In sci.space.policy Henry Spencer wrote:
In article .com,
Hyper wrote:
...and the limits imposed on fission by uranium supply.


Isn't the problem of supply obviated by using breeder reactors?


If you build the breeder reactors, and the corresponding reprocessing
plants; there are non-trivial political obstacles to doing so, not to
mention some remaining technical issues with existing breeder designs.


After India builds a dozen - and there are good reasons to think they
will - it will be much less of a problem. Give it a couple of decades.

[snip]

a long-term energy infrastructure on. Breeding -- preferably U-233 from
thorium rather than Pu-239 from U-238 -- would fix that, but it means
restarting breeder-reactor technology work quickly, and then building a
lot of breeder reactors and reprocessing plants in a hurry.


A lot of that demand is in places that have far more easier access to
thorium than uranium.

--
Sander

+++ Out of cheese error +++
 




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