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IndustryArena Forum > Community Club House > Environmental / Alternate Energy > Living an Oil Free Life Style (Fossil Oil That is Not Food Oil)
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  1. #1
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    Living an Oil Free Life Style (Fossil Oil That is Not Food Oil)

    For all you skeptics who say it cannot be done, here is an excerpt from an interview in the most recent "SMITHSONIAN". You can see the full text at:

    http://www.smithsonianmag.com/people...tml?c=y&page=1

    ........I wanted to see if I could reduce my oil and carbon footprint but still enjoy the amenities that we expect as Americans. In other words, to continue driving a motorized vehicle and have power at my house—not live like a total Grizzly Adams. Can I enjoy Netflix and the Internet without fossil fuels?

    Can the average working person live off the grid?
    Yes. Anybody can live an almost totally oil-free lifestyle. If your vehicle has a diesel engine, you can convert it to run on waste vegetable oil from restaurants. That's what I did for my ROAT, my Ridiculously Oversized American Truck. Solar power is totally feasible. Growing your own food takes an hour or two a day. But I would suggest that if one doesn't have an hour or two to work on one's life, one might be too busy.......
    An open mind is a virtue...so long as all the common sense has not leaked out.

  2. #2
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    Hi Geof,
    I wonder if an acre of land would be sufficient to grow enough bio-diesel to run a vehicle for a year. Say 20 MPG for your ROAT / 12,000 = 600 GPyear. Yep, all you'd need is an acre of ground and that would provide enough fuel to run your truck for a year.
    Not too bad.
    Take care,
    xyzdonna

  3. #3
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    Dear Geof,

    OK, I'll be a party-pooper..

    1) 41 acres is a bit of a larger spread that most of the world's inhabitants are likely to have at their disposal.

    2) New Mexico is blessed by solar radiation. You may need a few acres.

    3) Most of the world does not have a plentiful supply of fast food outlets, in the back yard, from which to harvest vegetable oil for their trucks.

    I'm being unkind, It is a step in the right direction, I suppose.

    Sorry.

    Best wishes,

    Martin

  4. #4
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    Quote Originally Posted by martinw View Post
    ....OK, I'll be a party-pooper....Sorry.

    Best wishes,

    Martin
    You disbeliever.
    An open mind is a virtue...so long as all the common sense has not leaked out.

  5. #5
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    Martin hasn't even dropped the biggest bomb given where this is posted: biodiesel still emits tons of greenhouse gasses.

    We have biodiesel all over Santa Cruz where I live. It's quite entertaining to get behind one in traffic. They're usually older Volvo and Mercedes diesel cars that were converted. And they smell like french fries. I kid you not. If there's much of it going on, buy McDonald's stock because it gives you the munchies!

    It's gonna take a lotta pebble bed nuclear reactors, fellas.

    Cheers,

    BW

  6. #6
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    Quote Originally Posted by BobWarfield View Post
    Martin hasn't even dropped the biggest bomb given where this is posted: biodiesel still emits tons of greenhouse gasses.......

    .......It's gonna take a lotta pebble bed nuclear reactors, fellas.

    Cheers,

    BW
    But the CO2 produced using biodiesel is no greater than the CO2 absorbed by the plants that grew and ultimately became the biodiesel' so there is no NET CO2 production. Therefore Biodiesel is "Green"!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Yes; 'lotta' is at least thre figures.
    An open mind is a virtue...so long as all the common sense has not leaked out.

  7. #7
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    Dear Bob,

    Yikes, I never even considered the ghastly smell of all that clapped-out McD frying oil.

    I suppose while tooling around your 41 acres of New Mexico, in the Green Truck, the stink might get dispersed.

    Best wishes,

    Martin

  8. #8
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    Until you park it overnight and the temperature drops to -15C and your fuel turns into gum like all those buses in Jolly Old Blighty.
    An open mind is a virtue...so long as all the common sense has not leaked out.

  9. #9
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    Quote Originally Posted by Geof View Post
    Until you park it overnight and the temperature drops to -15C and your fuel turns into gum like all those buses in Jolly Old Blighty.
    Dear Geof,

    This will be a problem. Although larger diesel fuel tanks tend to have heaters these days ( those smart engineers have anticipated "Global Cooling" ), what is going to power them?

    My guess..grid-supply nuclear power.

    Best wishes,

    Martin

  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by martinw View Post
    Dear Geof,

    This will be a problem. Although larger diesel fuel tanks tend to have heaters these days ( those smart engineers have anticipated "Global Cooling" ), what is going to power them?

    My guess..grid-supply nuclear power.

    Best wishes,

    Martin
    Allopw me to be pedantic; after all I do it so well.

    (I should comment my only failing is overweaning modesty)

    The term 'biodiesel' is thrown around rather loosely.

    It is possible to run a diesel engine on straight cooking oil, fat, drippings, whatever you cal it; provided you keep whatever it is above its melting point...and filter out the fragments of French Fries.

    But you have to keep things warm; over here you can buy kits that heat a supplementary fuel tank and the fuel lines to make this possible. However, you still have to start on straight diesel and switch to straight diesel before shutting the engine down.

    This is because the cooking oil/fat is a triglyceride that has tends to solidify at around room temp. If you don't know what a triglyceride is, tough.

    It is possible to take waste cooking oil and do a trans-esterification reaction to turn it into, more or less, the same structure as regular diesel oil.

    Regarding the heaters on large diesel fuel tanks; the 'smart engineers' are also smart economists. Diesel comes in many flavours, for vehicle fuel that will be used at low temperatures the preferred flavor has a low paraffin content; paraffins are waxes that solidify at 0 C or below. This means that high paraffin diesel does not have much market for vehicle fuel and is available at a lower cost; if you install heated tanks you can utilize a cheaper fuel.

    And what will fuel the heaters? Well, even with the most efficient diesel installation 60% of your energy is lost as heat; more than enough to keep your fuel tanks warm. More than enough to heat all the surrounding buildings if things were designed correctly.
    An open mind is a virtue...so long as all the common sense has not leaked out.

  11. #11
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    Just remember that if you're in the UK and use stuff like that to power your vehicle you have to account for every litre you use and pay the Customs and Excise (tax) man.. I kid you not... google it on UK
    I love deadlines- I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.

  12. #12
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    Quote Originally Posted by ImanCarrot View Post
    Just remember that if you're in the UK and use stuff like that to power your vehicle you have to account for every litre you use and pay the Customs and Excise (tax) man.. I kid you not... google it on UK
    Since you brought up the UK, vehicle power, and tax....this might be of interest:

    Biofuels: Fields of dreams
    We can run our cars on corn, sugar cane or wheat: limitless cheap energy grown on our doorstep. But are biofuels the answer to exhausted oil wells or just another nightmare scenario?

    http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/new...=1205102781064

  13. #13
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    Quote Originally Posted by fizzissist View Post
    fizzissist; Did you really read through all that crap? Or did you skim it like I just did? What is the writer getting at? Pro or Con?

    There is a saying I recall: "If you cannot blind them with science, baffle them with bull****". Which applies here?
    An open mind is a virtue...so long as all the common sense has not leaked out.

  14. #14
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    I think biofuels and atomic energy will be the power sources of the future. There are serious problems facing the biofuel market. I'm not even going to touch the energy in/out ratio for producing ethanol, as no one can give good solid numbers. The general pulse is that biodiesel gives net energy after production so I will shoot it down right now.

    In the last week the price for canola was over $17 a bushel. One can only get about 12 liters of oil out of a bushel of canola, so just the feed stock costs 1.42 a liter. One has to crush the seed, filter it, reform it (which is done with methanol, since it is still CHEAPER to make it from natural gas than it is to distill ethanol from corn or small grains), and distribute it.

    Now the supporters of biofuel will tell you that the processed grains and oilseeds can be sold for animal feed to offset the cost of the feed stock. This is true, but the price for livestock is depressed when the grain market is high. This means the feedlots don't feed out as many animals because the returns aren't there for them (too much money is spent on feed), and if the prices remain low long enough the primary producers (family cow/calf producers) liquidate their herd, which means there are fewer animals for the feedlot to buy and the price will come up in a normal market. Now that the market isn't normal because of the demand for food grains for fuel is growing. So if the biofuel plants sell off the "used" grain for less than they need to balance the books the price of their fuel is no longer viable because of the cost. It's an endless circle...

    Any way I feel once methods for producing biofuel from WASTE products (straw, bark, grass) products come of age they will be a very economical, and benificial energy source.

    To make a real dent in carbon outputs electricity production needs to be shifted away from fossil fuels to wind, solar, hydro, and nuclear. Out of all these nuclear is the only one that is mature enough to have a chance of meeting demand.

    Out of all this we still have all of this carbon in the atmosphere to deal with (that they say will doom us all). The earth is a closed ecosystem, so the carbon that is here has always been here, so how much harm will it really cause?


    Just some food for thought.
    On all equipment there are 2 levers...
    Lever "A", and Lever F'in "B"

  15. #15
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    Hah! with all these new fangled renewable resources, 'tis refreshing to know that we in the UK are at the forefront in maintaining traditional methods of generating electricity.

    The UK plans to open a £1bn Coal Powered Plant in Kent, the first in 20 years. The Govt has signaled it's approval.

    I always liked a coal fire. Wonder if we'll open cast mine the coal in the reserves left under England's natural beauty spots or import it from poorer countries whos coal has a higher sulphur content hehe

    Oh well, at least they've told us to change over to energy efficient house light bulbs, so we're doing something.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2...d=networkfront
    I love deadlines- I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.

  16. #16
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    Quote Originally Posted by DSL PWR View Post
    .... It's an endless circle...

    Any way I feel once methods for producing biofuel from WASTE products (straw, bark, grass) products come of age they will be a very economical, and benificial energy source.
    ...
    Out of all these nuclear is the only one that is mature enough to have a chance of meeting demand.

    Out of all this we still have all of this carbon in the atmosphere to deal with (that they say will doom us all). The earth is a closed ecosystem, so the carbon that is here has always been here, so how much harm will it really cause?


    Just some food for thought.
    Yes the biofuels from potential food crops is a circle spiralling down into inanity. But producing fuel from 'waste' products is also not practical, there simply is not enough waste to produce more than a few percent of current petroleum consumption.

    Nuclear is the most energy abundant option but even then to replace electrical energy derived from hydrocarbon fuels (natural gas, oil or coal) would require hundreds of new nuclear plants across North America. Roughly speaking across the whole continent about 20% of current electricity is from nuclear, about 55% from hydrocarbon fuels and the rest from hydro, wind, solar. Certainly in some locations sources such as hydro are far more important but it is necessary to take a broad view. I think these numbers are close enough, I am going from memory. If you find better ones all you need to do to get the increase in the number of nuclear plants is divide the hydrocarbon percent by the nuclear percent; 55/20 = 2.75 and multiply this by the number of existing nuclear plants. And is merely replacing electrical generation. When you take into account that hydrocarbon energy consumed in transportation, both personal automobiles and commercial transport, and consumed directly in industrial processes exceeds that used for electricity generation the number of new nuclear plants needed is not 2.75 what already exists, it gets into two figures. There simply is no way to replace current energy consumption from hydrocarbon sources by any other source, there isn't one.

    And while it is true CO2 has been around ever since life has existed on the earth it has varied widely. If the Global Warming (Whoops, now it is Climate Change)doomsayers are correct, and the increase in atmospheric CO2 is going to cause catastrophic changes, we are stuck. There is no way to remove what is there, there is no way to stop adding more, and because of the lag time in climate response even if by some magical method we could stop adding more the changes predicted for the next 50 to 100 years will still occur. There is no choice if and/or when the changes occur it will be necessary to adapt.
    An open mind is a virtue...so long as all the common sense has not leaked out.

  17. #17
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    Quote Originally Posted by Geof View Post
    Yes the biofuels from potential food crops is a circle spiralling down into inanity. But producing fuel from 'waste' products is also not practical, there simply is not enough waste to produce more than a few percent of current petroleum consumption.

    Nuclear is the most energy abundant option but even then to replace electrical energy derived from hydrocarbon fuels (natural gas, oil or coal) would require hundreds of new nuclear plants across North America. Roughly speaking across the whole continent about 20% of current electricity is from nuclear, about 55% from hydrocarbon fuels and the rest from hydro, wind, solar. Certainly in some locations sources such as hydro are far more important but it is necessary to take a broad view. I think these numbers are close enough, I am going from memory. If you find better ones all you need to do to get the increase in the number of nuclear plants is divide the hydrocarbon percent by the nuclear percent; 55/20 = 2.75 and multiply this by the number of existing nuclear plants. And is merely replacing electrical generation. When you take into account that hydrocarbon energy consumed in transportation, both personal automobiles and commercial transport, and consumed directly in industrial processes exceeds that used for electricity generation the number of new nuclear plants needed is not 2.75 what already exists, it gets into two figures. There simply is no way to replace current energy consumption from hydrocarbon sources by any other source, there isn't one.

    And while it is true CO2 has been around ever since life has existed on the earth it has varied widely. If the Global Warming (Whoops, now it is Climate Change)doomsayers are correct, and the increase in atmospheric CO2 is going to cause catastrophic changes, we are stuck. There is no way to remove what is there, there is no way to stop adding more, and because of the lag time in climate response even if by some magical method we could stop adding more the changes predicted for the next 50 to 100 years will still occur. There is no choice if and/or when the changes occur it will be necessary to adapt.
    Yeoww Geof,
    This seems to contradict what you wrote me in the other forum, now you say we're doomed! You finally brought me around to thinking GW was a dead issue, now this.
    Take care,
    xyzdonna

  18. #18
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    Palm Oil and the environment, the reality

    http://www.foeeurope.org/publication...ial_Impact.pdf

    ...and Geof, yes I did read the WHOLE loooonnnnggggg and drawn out article... I got a sense the author was actually trying to be unbiased.

    One thing certain, you don't get something for nothing.

  19. #19
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    Quote Originally Posted by xyzdonna View Post
    Yeoww Geof,
    This seems to contradict what you wrote me in the other forum, now you say we're doomed! You finally brought me around to thinking GW was a dead issue, now this.
    Take care,
    xyzdonna
    You still do not read things completely'

    I do not deny Global Warming.

    I do not even deny that some portion of it is anthropogenic; I say it is not proven and the magnitude of the anthropogenic effect, if it exists, is unknown.

    I do say nothing can be done about the warming, and outline why CO2 emissions cannot be cut back whether or not cuts would have any affect.

    I do say humans will have to adapt.
    An open mind is a virtue...so long as all the common sense has not leaked out.

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