Is diesel dead?

[renewablejohn]

England cannot be self sufficient in biofuel or anywhere near it.  3.95 persons per hectare and growing.   To have anything like  self sufficiency  there has to be a much  changed attitude to solar,  wind and tidal energy and this means using electric cars.       

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/2967374/England-is-most-crowded-country-in-Europe.html

dhaslam

I would have to disagree with you. We have plenty of Biomass in this country to support our needs but not our wasteful life styles.  It is not rocket science the technology already exists its just that this country is run by brown envelopes and until that changes we will carry on with our soup bowl waiting for the odd crumb.

[Ancient Brewer]

Are we talking the UK or Canada?

[Ancient Brewer]

England cannot be self sufficient in biofuel or anywhere near it.  3.95 persons per hectare and growing.   To have anything like  self sufficiency  there has to be a much  changed attitude to solar,  wind and tidal energy and this means using electric cars.       

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/2967374/England-is-most-crowded-country-in-Europe.html

dhaslam

I would have to disagree with you. We have plenty of Biomass in this country to support our needs but not our wasteful life styles.  It is not rocket science the technology already exists its just that this country is run by brown envelopes and until that changes we will carry on with our soup bowl waiting for the odd crumb.

Providing we accept per capita levels of energy consumption circa 1350AD

[billi]

Providing we accept per capita levels of energy consumption circa 1350AD Wink

thanks , very constructive information , i hear these phrases  now since over 25 years .... the stone age argument 

must be a lack of interest , or too confident in their nu.... technology  , that stopped them to think further ....


every idea that can provide biofuel /energy , without shortening our food production in Europe should be considered as a source and a market

Billi

[renewablejohn]

Are we talking the UK or Canada?

We are talking UK

I am fed up with this argument that capita levels have to radically drop. Just consider your own wasteful life style as to what you consume and what you throw away. The technology already exists to convert the majority of your consumption into energy.

Being at the sharp end using this technology here are a few examples of what could be achieved using your wasteful lifestyle to convert into energy.


All food waste                            Anerobic Digestion Biomass generator
All wood/cardbord /paper             Biomass generator
All solid toilet matter                   Biomass generator
All Plastic                                   Conversion into diesel and Biomass Generator
All rubber tyres                           Steel recycled rubber to Biomass Generator
All Glass                                     Converted to glass wool insulation

[biff]

petrol versus diesel,
                         its easy really, if your milage is under 10,thou a year then small petrol is your man,if you are on the road day and night and clocking up 30 thou plus then it has to be diesel, our local delivery man drives a mondeo,1.7 turbo diesel car,,09 model,road tax is just 154euro, it does 50 plus to the gallon and carries a very big load with its seats removed.i watched him filling it up with micro wave ovens,i could,nt believe my eyes the load it was carrying and this is over the worst roads in ireland. new generation diesels are a class act. the common rail is a massive step forward.for someone like me who transplanted a b.m.c 1.5 diesel into a hillman hunter years ago i have nothing but admiration for peugeots 1.4hdi diesel.,,sure even henry is putting them in his fiestas. yup,, i just love diesels. they go forever.
                   biff.

[billi]

i still do wonder how much farming  can be done underneath wind farms or PV -farms and how that space is calculated ?

I understand that a sun loving plants wouldnot like to be shaded by  PV panels , but a sheep wouldnot mind , or?

Do they calculate  area of land only for one resource ?

Wind and PV  would allow  "multi" layer farming   

Billi

[dhaslam]

I wouldn't think that wind turbines interfere  much with   farming.   Most of the hilltop locations are used for  grass based enterprises only.   

This was taken with my phone so loses a bit of definition  when cropped

[Ancient Brewer]

Are we talking the UK or Canada?

We are talking UK

I am fed up with this argument that capita levels have to radically drop. Just consider your own wasteful life style as to what you consume and what you throw away. The technology already exists to convert the majority of your consumption into energy.

Being at the sharp end using this technology here are a few examples of what could be achieved using your wasteful lifestyle to convert into energy.


All food waste                            Anerobic Digestion Biomass generator
All wood/cardbord /paper             Biomass generator
All solid toilet matter                   Biomass generator
All Plastic                                   Conversion into diesel and Biomass Generator
All rubber tyres                           Steel recycled rubber to Biomass Generator
All Glass                                     Converted to glass wool insulation

I don't have any issues with any of the above but the idea that Biomass can 'meet our needs' is fanciful in the extreme. A statement along the lines of 'biomass can meet part of our needs' would not of drawn any comment from me.

The above comment regarding materials ignores the fact that most paper is imported. A significant proportion is recycled. If we burn / digest it all we suddenly have to import / grow much more pulp / timber.

As far as I was aware we already recycle lots of glass - your comment suggests this would be ground breaking?

Biomass utilising genuine waste products is great - no argument whatsoever on this score. However most agricultural land is already used for food production. Secondly using marginal amenity land (road embankments etc) would yield a fair amount of fuel but its diffuse and costs energy to collect and concentrate - the net available energy maybe somewhat less than the gross availability. Even going over to growing miscanthus on 100% of the UK's land area would only meet 70-80% of the Uk's primary energy requirements. You can extrapolate this whatever way you want - biofuels / biomass is only ever going to be a small but useful contribution to Uk energy supply

[Ancient Brewer]

i still do wonder how much farming  can be done underneath wind farms or PV -farms and how that space is calculated ?

I understand that a sun loving plants wouldnot like to be shaded by  PV panels , but a sheep wouldnot mind , or?

Do they calculate  area of land only for one resource ?

Wind and PV  would allow  "multi" layer farming   

Billi

This is where Wind and to some extent solar beats biomass hands down. They both have a very small land footprint assuming the PV utilises roof space areas.

[guydewdney]

As far as I was aware we already recycle lots of glass - your comment suggests this would be ground breaking?

Sadly not. Well - not as you think its is being used. A good friend of ours runs a well known west country glass company, and he lives, breathes, eats, sleeps glass. You might call him obsessed.

He has catagorically told us that the vast majority of glass actually gets smashed up and turned into road chippings. Glass has the odd property that differnt glass makeups (from different batches - let alone different factories) have differnt coefficient of expansions. Thus - if you mix two or more diffent glasses together, and blow a bottle (or whatever) - it will not survive, as it will crack. It's a lower energy input to make new glass than to mix old manky glass. Its basically only sand anyway... So stop wasting your time separating the clear from the coloured - as the M4 motorway doesnt care....

[dhaslam]

Bottles shouldn't  need to be melted down, just washed and reused.    The problem is that there is no standard for bottles.  Practically every product has a different bottle.     In Ireland the Irish Glass Bottle Company  had so  much capacity in the 1960s that they had to persuade  drinks companies  to use non returnable bottles.    It was a scandal at the time  that all the non returnable  bottles littered  streets and beaches.  Also the  factory was a major user of electricity and  had to be kept running  during periods when there were power cuts in the 70s.    Of course the redevelopment of the IGB site is in the news again  as one of the worst  investment  decisions of the property boom.         

[Ancient Brewer]

As far as I was aware we already recycle lots of glass - your comment suggests this would be ground breaking?

Sadly not. Well - not as you think its is being used. A good friend of ours runs a well known west country glass company, and he lives, breathes, eats, sleeps glass. You might call him obsessed.

He has catagorically told us that the vast majority of glass actually gets smashed up and turned into road chippings. Glass has the odd property that differnt glass makeups (from different batches - let alone different factories) have differnt coefficient of expansions. Thus - if you mix two or more diffent glasses together, and blow a bottle (or whatever) - it will not survive, as it will crack. It's a lower energy input to make new glass than to mix old manky glass. Its basically only sand anyway... So stop wasting your time separating the clear from the coloured - as the M4 motorway doesnt care....

100% agree.

The energy economics of glass recycling have always been negative as distinct from reuse. There is no major argument either for saving materials given that glass is prodimatmly silicia - hardly in short supply. Its inert so other than the space it takes up in that landfill there is no issue there

However conversion into road material or loft insulation is better than landfilling as it saves either agregates or oil.

[charlieb]

Was in Norway recently and totally inspired by re-usable clear plastic bottles - seems an even better idea than glass, as initial energy investment is lower. (They recycle the glass ones too).   I spent happy minutes pushing the bottles (they have a clever extra rim) into the re-use machine in all supermarkets, and getting my pennies back.

I seem to remember from my MSc that one of the reasons we don't reuse bottles in the UK was that EU Legislation to bring in bottle standards came up against legal opposition from the big bad Coca Cola Co. - they wanted unique bottles for their marketing.     Non EU Norway must have told Coca Cola lawyers to sod off. 

[renewablejohn]

I don't have any issues with any of the above but the idea that Biomass can 'meet our needs' is fanciful in the extreme. A statement along the lines of 'biomass can meet part of our needs' would not of drawn any comment from me.

The above comment regarding materials ignores the fact that most paper is imported. A significant proportion is recycled. If we burn / digest it all we suddenly have to import / grow much more pulp / timber.

As far as I was aware we already recycle lots of glass - your comment suggests this would be ground breaking?

Biomass utilising genuine waste products is great - no argument whatsoever on this score. However most agricultural land is already used for food production. Secondly using marginal amenity land (road embankments etc) would yield a fair amount of fuel but its diffuse and costs energy to collect and concentrate - the net available energy maybe somewhat less than the gross availability. Even going over to growing miscanthus on 100% of the UK's land area would only meet 70-80% of the Uk's primary energy requirements. You can extrapolate this whatever way you want - biofuels / biomass is only ever going to be a small but useful contribution to Uk energy supply

Ancient Brewer

The comment "meet our needs" was made on purpose to get away from the McKay type scenario that one technology will be used at the expense of other technologies.  Biomass should only be used as the stop gap in energy when solar is not available.

In my model 10 sq mtrs of thermal oil solar will provide sufficient energy for the average household for all but 100 days per year for which Biomass will be required. As our primary Biomass burner we will use the Dunsley Yorkshire (thermal oil) for 6 hours per day using 3kg of fuel per hour say 20kg per day times 100 days equals 2 tonne per annum with 20 million homes thats 40 million tonnes per year. Which is not a great deal of biomass when you consider over 10 million tonnes of woodwaste is put into landfill each year.

Assumptions made in the model includes max 3kw electric can be generated on demand with grid tied generator. Average solar gain to be 1 kw per sq mtr for 6 hours per day. All UK households have minimum 2 occupants.

Very little paper is now recycled as it used to be exported to china and the chinese no longer want it so the price has dropped resulting in stock piles of recycled paper going to landfill

Land used for food production also produces Biomass ie wheat straw, barley straw, this can still be used for animal bedding and converted to biomass fuel once the animals have finished with it.

We are already working with local authorities to recover this amenity woodwaste and torrefication of wood is a good use of direct solar energy by a process using Thermal Oil.