fossil fuels

[member]

well i got to thinkin today what would happen when we ran out of fossil fuels??? i asked my dad about it and he told me i probably woudnt see it in my lifetime,... but if we did run out what would we do??? would all our toys have engines like the ones that run off of hydrogen power?? man i sure wish we dont run out of fuels in my lifetime, well post your thoughts on this if ya want im interested to hear what ya think

[Juggalo]

ha funny, i have thought of the same thing and frankly i don't know. my guess is somebody will come up with a replacment for petrolium that will work in most of its old applications.

[member]

yea i would probably be in denial if i couldnt ride my quad:( :(

[hondafox440]

I had to do a big report last year on alternative energy sources. I did nuclear fission, but read alot about nuclear fusion. All I can say is the possibilities of fusion based electricity are endless once we learn to harness and sustain a reaction. Problem with fusion is currently it requires more electricity to maintain a reaction than the reaction can create.

As for engines, I think the hydrogen fuel cell is the future.

[zephead400ex]

Originally posted by hondafox440
I had to do a big report last year on alternative energy sources. I did nuclear fission, but read alot about nuclear fusion. All I can say is the possibilities of fusion based electricity are endless once we learn to harness and sustain a reaction. Problem with fusion is currently it requires more electricity to maintain a reaction than the reaction can create.

As for engines, I think the hydrogen fuel cell is the future.

Once nuclear fusion energy is evolved and we are able to use this as an alternative energy souce, we will not have to worry so much about using fossil fuels as an energy source.

haha, once we can act live "God" and create energy like the Sun, we will be fine! haha!

peace

[cool 300ex]

I don't think we will ever run out of fossil fules in our lifetime but we will sooner or later. But when it does we will just have to find a replace ment.

[hondafox440]

Originally posted by zephead400ex
Once nuclear fusion energy is evolved and we are able to use this as an alternative energy souce, we will not have to worry so much about using fossil fuels as an energy source.

haha, once we can act live "God" and create energy like the Sun, we will be fine! haha!

peace

Yea. MIT actually has a working nuclear fusion reactor. The fuels for nuclear fusion are basically endless. Hydrogen is easily removed from water, and 70% fo the earth's surface is water. The only waste from fusion is helium, which is an inert gas that escapes into the atmosphere and disperses, and is completely harmless.

[kamikaze_rzrbak]

Originally posted by hondafox440

As for engines, I think the hydrogen fuel cell is the future.
but dosnt it take fossil fuels to run a hydrogen fuel cell, i think i heard that on car and Drivers Tv show, and they are hella expensive

[hondafox440]

It runs on hydrogen as far as I know.

id run mine on steam

[hondafox440]

Originally posted by freeride132
id run mine on steam

How are you gonna heat the steam? ;)

with fire

id burn trees and people

[zephead400ex]

Originally posted by freeride132
id burn trees and people

:huh...for heat or dinner?

[batgeek]

yep, i plan on burning stupid f^ckin teenagers for fuel.

[310Rduner]

Originally posted by batgeek
yep, i plan on burning stupid f^ckin teenagers for fuel.

Nah.. not stupid teenagers.. bump it up to Stupid people in general.. unlimited fuel then..

[lil400exman]

Originally posted by hondafox440
I had to do a big report last year on alternative energy sources. I did nuclear fission, but read alot about nuclear fusion. All I can say is the possibilities of fusion based electricity are endless once we learn to harness and sustain a reaction. Problem with fusion is currently it requires more electricity to maintain a reaction than the reaction can create.

As for engines, I think the hydrogen fuel cell is the future.
they make synthetic gas it only costs 75 cents more a barrel to produce and we use trash like tires and tv's to make it. I think here pretty soon we will be using that instead of pumping that out of the ground;)

Originally posted by batgeek
yep, i plan on burning stupid f^ckin teenagers for fuel.

im gonna burn haiwan surfer dudes with h^ge ear rings

[markeg192]

I think they estimate 50 years until fossil fuel is gone.

[AndrewRRR]

Hey LP has 120 octane, I wouldn't mind running that with... say about 250psi compression? Wait, I have kick start bikes, nevermind. lol

[airheadedduner]

Originally posted by hondafox440
How are you gonna heat the steam? ;)
With all the hot air he blows

[Rip_Tear]

This is an easy one...

Alcohol, Hydrogen, Propane, solar power, fission, etc


That synthetic gas you were talking about is just alcohol, or something like it, made from corn or other kinds of vegtables... I had to write a huge assignment in geography. You can run vehicles on hydrogen gas, but its not near as stable as a fuel cell. Hydrogen will eventually be cheaper... there are a lot of different types of fuels that could be used, do a search on the net, there is a ton on info on this.

[nacs400ex]

Originally posted by freeride132
im gonna burn haiwan surfer dudes with h^ge ear rings

:eek: Damn Alaskaspeed and Batgeek sure dont like us teenagers. Well funny thing is they were once teenagers too.

Originally posted by airheadedduner
With all the hot air he blows


your the air head

[310Rduner]

I think Nuclear power, and hydrogen are where the money is going to be spent. If people would stop being ignorant, and stop listening to the liberal media and every other ignorant person out there who is just afraid to here the word "nuclear" they would realize how SAFE it actually is. People hear nuclear plants and they think Chernobyl, and the meltdown. It's pure bs to think that any properly built nuclear powerplant would meltdown like that. They don't, Chernobyl only went big because they used graphite to cool the rods, and not water. They also neglected to add any sort of outer shell:rolleyes:. The only people dead, or seriously affected because of Chernobly were the firemen directly exposed to the flames, and open nuclear materials. To this day they still follow the medical cases of all those who lived in the area at the time, and even after the people were exposed to Thousands of Mrems they didn't show any increased cancer rates. Chernobyl was a stupid design choice made by their incompetent scientists. Three Mile Island, they calculated that the people living in the area were only exposed to 2-5 mrems.... you receive more natural radiation from rocks than that; and you receive 40 mrem's every time you get an x-ray. Also, Nuclear power plants can't produce nuclear explosions like a nuclear bomb, its a completely different design, the worst case would be that it melted down, and was contained by the outer shells. The half-life of uranium is high, but it takes only Ten years for the level of radioactivity to decrease by 1000 fold. In 500 years it has the same radioactivity as it did when it was first mined out of the ground. A normally operating powerplant released 2-4 mrem's of radiation per year, again this is a negligable amount. A nuclear powerplant produces no pollutants, what you see billowing from the cooling towers is steam. Think about this also, a uranium pellet the size of the tip of your pinky can power a nuclear aircraft carrier for 20 years (not 100% if it is 20 or 50 years); how much coal or gas do you think that would take??

My prediction is that there won't be any new nuclear powerplants for a while, but I think that eventually we will turn back to it, especially with the new stage 4 designs, and their high level of safety.

I pretty much see it as the only alternative energy source, and it will more than likely be THE primary source in the near future. Solar power is too expensive, only operates during the day, and it needs a huge amount of space to power just a single house. I believe the figure is 500,00 sq feet for 1 house, PER year.

I think that solar, wind, and a few other designs out there are simply idealistic wishes, they will never be practical to the real world.

[AndrewRRR]

My quad is going nuclear man! lol
There are lots of alternatives to fossil fuels. The oil companies conveniently keep them down so we'll continue to pay $1.80 a gallon for gas (or $4 a gallon if you have to run race gas like me). I'll welcome alternative fuels that give the same or better properties than gas.
I just can't picture a totally silent nuclear powered quad, no matter how fast it is, lol.

[KASCHAK]

some people on here are smarter then i thought. i think that if we learn to harness the power of electricity we could use that.

[member]

yea that would be wierd seein a quad goin like 50 but not makin any sound...:eek2:

[AndrewRRR]

Originally posted by member
yea that would be wierd seein a quad goin like 50 but not makin any sound...:eek2:

Then the newbies will be asking which exhaust whirrs the loudest. lol

[Nausty]

Originally posted by member
well i got to thinkin today what would happen when we ran out of fossil fuels??? i asked my dad about it and he told me i probably woudnt see it in my lifetime,... but if we did run out what would we do??? would all our toys have engines like the ones that run off of hydrogen power?? man i sure wish we dont run out of fuels in my lifetime, well post your thoughts on this if ya want im interested to hear what ya think

If we run out of gas we can just go to the gas stations and get some more...:rolleyes:



j/p lol

[hondafox440]

Originally posted by 310Rduner
I think Nuclear power, and hydrogen are where the money is going to be spent. If people would stop being ignorant, and stop listening to the liberal media and every other ignorant person out there who is just afraid to here the word "nuclear" they would realize how SAFE it actually is. People hear nuclear plants and they think Chernobyl, and the meltdown. It's pure bs to think that any properly built nuclear powerplant would meltdown like that. They don't, Chernobyl only went big because they used graphite to cool the rods, and not water. They also neglected to add any sort of outer shell:rolleyes:. The only people dead, or seriously affected because of Chernobly were the firemen directly exposed to the flames, and open nuclear materials. To this day they still follow the medical cases of all those who lived in the area at the time, and even after the people were exposed to Thousands of Mrems they didn't show any increased cancer rates. Chernobyl was a stupid design choice made by their incompetent scientists. Three Mile Island, they calculated that the people living in the area were only exposed to 2-5 mrems.... you receive more natural radiation from rocks than that; and you receive 40 mrem's every time you get an x-ray. Also, Nuclear power plants can't produce nuclear explosions like a nuclear bomb, its a completely different design, the worst case would be that it melted down, and was contained by the outer shells. The half-life of uranium is high, but it takes only Ten years for the level of radioactivity to decrease by 1000 fold. In 500 years it has the same radioactivity as it did when it was first mined out of the ground. A normally operating powerplant released 2-4 mrem's of radiation per year, again this is a negligable amount. A nuclear powerplant produces no pollutants, what you see billowing from the cooling towers is steam. Think about this also, a uranium pellet the size of the tip of your pinky can power a nuclear aircraft carrier for 20 years (not 100% if it is 20 or 50 years); how much coal or gas do you think that would take??

My prediction is that there won't be any new nuclear powerplants for a while, but I think that eventually we will turn back to it, especially with the new stage 4 designs, and their high level of safety.

I pretty much see it as the only alternative energy source, and it will more than likely be THE primary source in the near future. Solar power is too expensive, only operates during the day, and it needs a huge amount of space to power just a single house. I believe the figure is 500,00 sq feet for 1 house, PER year.

I think that solar, wind, and a few other designs out there are simply idealistic wishes, they will never be practical to the real world.

You brought up some good points, but you're only partially correct.

The reactor that melted down at Chernobyl was an RBMK design reactor. Although these types of reactors have two major advantages over PWRs, CANDUs, and BWRs, (huge amounts of power generated, and no downtime during refueling) there are some major flaws in the design. The RBMK reactor uses light (not saturated with deuterium) water in the cooling system. The problem with light water is it absorbs stray neutrons, and if too much heat is generated in the core, the cooling system fails because the void reactivity coefficient rises. At Chernobyl, they were testing to see if they could safely gain more power from the reactor (they performed the test in the middle of the night) when a power surge was created, and the cooling system failed, causing the reactor to melt down. I believe there were 200 control rods in the core of Chernobyl, which means it is a HUGE core. Typical PWRs have about 37 control rods. Also, the RBMK reactor does in fact have an outer shell (called the sheild). All reactors have a concrete sheild. The Russian government isn't to concerned about Chernobyl, although they should be. People and things were affected WORLDWIDE by it, and it really is a much bigger problem than you make it out to be. I couldn't imagine the number of people affected by it, and how the government is ignoring them. You should read more about the cleanup of Chernobly, about how they used soldiers they called "Human Robots" to run in, throw graphite blocks into the core and run back out before they died, and about the scientists who have been going into the sarcophagus daily searching for lost fuel rods.

Nuclear ships require more than a pinky sized ball of U-235. It is closer to a basketball size, which by comparison to the amount of diesel it would use is still immensly small.

The halflife of U-235 is 713 million years. That means it takes about 6 billion years to completely decay into it's daughter substance, Pb-207 (lead). After a few hundred thousand years it will become "low level" radiation, since the concentration of U-235 in the fuel rods of nuclear reactors is relatively low, and it is glassified and mixed with other substances after it is spent. Nuclear waste is still a BIG problem, and we need places like WIPP and Yucca.

Wind/solar/tidal energy is still being developed. It is practical, and it is only a matter of years before you see it in use.

how the **** are you guys so smart?:mad:

[hondafox440]

Bump, what say you 310R?

[310Rduner]

I'm tired, and my arms are too sore from scrubbing dishes last night to write a HUGE response again, but I got some left in me:)

I can't guarantee the info I passed on about the radioactivity of the uranium, it was just info my chemistry teacher passed onto us, so it may be wrong but I don't quite think so. I know it has a long half life, but it was something to the point that it still shrugs off some of its radioactivity regardless of this fact. The only reason that nuclear wastes are in issue is that our government took the standpoint that we shouldn't recycle, and reuse the uranium because of ignorant public outcry back in the 60's and 70's. If you look at Japan, and france they are re-using the uranium and do not consider it a waste. And because it is re-used it doesn't just sit around and become a hazard. And I am pretty positive that it is a finger tip sized pellet that powers either the nuclear aircraft carriers, or the subs. It may be the subs and I just confused it, I know it powers one of the two because we had 2 speakers from the Navy's nuclear power program that do all the sub, and ship work.

I think the biggest reason that Nuclear power works so well in France is because they went out and educated the people about what, and how nuclear power works. I also think it is more efficient in the regulations, mostly because it is all over-watched by the Government, and not 30 separate commisions like it is here. Although I can see where it sets up like checks and balances here, but it still isnt AS efficient in my mind.

I still stand that solar, and wind energy sources aren't enough. If we wanted to move off of fossil fuels, those types wouldn't be enough. If you want to use them in combination with nuclear power then sure I think they could help, every little bit counts. But both of those rely on surface area, and thus a lot of LAND that in some places we are already running short of. Course, you could always plant them miles of coast in such a way that it doesn't disturb anything, like their doing near the Hamptons, or Maine is it?

I still see us coming back to Nuclear power though, especially if the decision were to be made to recycle the uranium and re-use it.
Nuclear power is essentially limitless, and this is the reason why I see us coming back to it, there is so much gain for so little; and this is what the company's and government really look for, besides just safety and cleanliness.

[310Rduner]

Guess I did have a long reply in me, lol.

[AndrewRRR]

Originally posted by hondafox440
You brought up some good points, but you're only partially correct.

The reactor that melted down at Chernobyl was an RBMK design reactor. Although these types of reactors have two major advantages over PWRs, CANDUs, and BWRs, (huge amounts of power generated, and no downtime during refueling) there are some major flaws in the design. The RBMK reactor uses light (not saturated with deuterium) water in the cooling system. The problem with light water is it absorbs stray neutrons, and if too much heat is generated in the core, the cooling system fails because the void reactivity coefficient rises. At Chernobyl, they were testing to see if they could safely gain more power from the reactor (they performed the test in the middle of the night) when a power surge was created, and the cooling system failed, causing the reactor to melt down. I believe there were 200 control rods in the core of Chernobyl, which means it is a HUGE core. Typical PWRs have about 37 control rods. Also, the RBMK reactor does in fact have an outer shell (called the sheild). All reactors have a concrete sheild. The Russian government isn't to concerned about Chernobyl, although they should be. People and things were affected WORLDWIDE by it, and it really is a much bigger problem than you make it out to be. I couldn't imagine the number of people affected by it, and how the government is ignoring them. You should read more about the cleanup of Chernobly, about how they used soldiers they called "Human Robots" to run in, throw graphite blocks into the core and run back out before they died, and about the scientists who have been going into the sarcophagus daily searching for lost fuel rods.

Nuclear ships require more than a pinky sized ball of U-235. It is closer to a basketball size, which by comparison to the amount of diesel it would use is still immensly small.

The halflife of U-235 is 713 million years. That means it takes about 6 billion years to completely decay into it's daughter substance, Pb-207 (lead). After a few hundred thousand years it will become "low level" radiation, since the concentration of U-235 in the fuel rods of nuclear reactors is relatively low, and it is glassified and mixed with other substances after it is spent. Nuclear waste is still a BIG problem, and we need places like WIPP and Yucca.

Wind/solar/tidal energy is still being developed. It is practical, and it is only a matter of years before you see it in use.

As long as it powers my flux capacitor I'm in!

[AndrewRRR]

Originally posted by hondafox440

Wind/solar/tidal energy is still being developed. It is practical, and it is only a matter of years before you see it in use.

I hope they do a better job of pulling more power out of wind generators. These were put in about two years ago near where we hunt. Guess who paid for them? They cost several million dollars a piece (and there are hundreds) and they only put out about enough power to power your average treehugger's vibrator, which is good because the power they generate goes to Eugene.

http://pictureposter.allbrand.nu/pictures/AndrewRRR/P1010030.JPG