At the time of this videos, Indycars ran on methanol rather than ethanol. Ethanol has a very faint blue flame, but methanol is almost perfectly clear, though you can see the flames as sort of a shimmering disturbance in the air. These days Indycars run on ethanol, but it's more of a marketing thing than for any practical reason... the racing industry is hard up to show how "green" they are.



>> ^GeeSussFreeK:

>> ^bamdrew:
Are we sure this isn't a very elaborate Monty Python sketch?

While I am sure this is a joke, you can actually do this experiment at home with alcohol. Get yourself some everclear or some other very highly pure ethanol and set it ablaze. And did you notice he used the word inflammable. That is the correct word, we only recently made the word flammable up because it confused to many people.

>> ^bamdrew:

Are we sure this isn't a very elaborate Monty Python sketch?


While I am sure this is a joke, you can actually do this experiment at home with alcohol. Get yourself some everclear or some other very highly pure ethanol and set it ablaze. And did you notice he used the word inflammable. That is the correct word, we only recently made the word flammable up because it confused to many people.

Don't put ethanol into your car just yet. In most engines it will actually make everything seize up, and you'll pretty much need to get a new car or engine.

i like this energy idea

http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/nl100550k

engineered bacteria that use Sunlight and CO2 to produce simple sugars that can be converted to ethanol using yeast. almost no waste products and uses waste products.

jwray, don't miss the forest for the trees. His main problem with HFCS is that its the product of government subsidies for special interests that, along with tariffs protecting the cane sugar industry, resulting ultimately in a higher effective cost for Americans. Additionally, another problem with the subsidies is that it pays for farmers to produce corn, and with such a surplus of corn, the industry pushes its supply of corn into whatever supply chain it can....including things such as HFCS, corn ethanol, corn-fed beef, all of which have deleterious effects on the health of our society and economy.

He believes that the biggest impact of corn subsidies on our public health result from using antibiotics that should be judiciously restricted for human health is indiscriminately given to keep corn-fed cattle alive while fattening to slaughter, which simultaneously selects for bacteria that are resistant to said antibiotics.

It's my understanding that the cause of corn subsidies is that the single largest corn producing state, Iowa, also has the first presidential primary. Any candidate against corn subsidies (corn ethanol among them) is weeded out before the rest of the nation has a say.

Why the hell do we do it that way? What reason could there be to give a few states such disproportionate power in the primaries? And in the general election why do we hold on to a system originally designed to give slave owners disproportionate power?

Sorry, but...

"(...)In the movie Animals Are Beautiful People by Jamie Uys, released in 1974, some scenes portray elephants, warthogs and monkeys becoming intoxicated from eating fermented marula fruit. Later research showed that these scenes were improbable and, in all probability, staged. Elephants would need a huge amount of fermented marulas to have any effect on them, and other animals prefer the ripe fruit. The amount of water drunk by elephants each day would also dilute the effect of the fruit to such an extent that they would not be affected by it."

Source: Morris, Steve; David Humphreys and Dan Reynolds (2006). "Myth, marula, and elephant: an assessment of voluntary ethanol intoxication of the African elephant (Loxodonta africana) following feeding on the fruit of the marula tree (Sclerocarya birrea)". Physiological and Biochemical Zoology
- via wikipedia

>> ^Porksandwich:

From third party experience and personal observations of the system, the checks and balances need to be returned into the system. Like I stated earlier, the police department refused to comply with written orders from a judge. And this same judge when shown the paperwork the police department wanted signed said that he'd never seen that paperwork before and that he himself wouldn't have signed it under any circumstance.
There's just too much complication to the system, each part of the 3 wanting to take the powers of the other two upon itself while being completely kept out of the loop as to the other branches goings on. No handful of people have the time to check out the other goings on when they are so busy trying to get more power for themselves.
They need to implement a system in which laws that are reviewed and thrown out when a new law takes over it's function, or if the law is outdated with the times and requires an update to create an update that doesn't require broad interpretation of every word in it. Lots of interpretation slowly becomes the new "spirit" of the law that was never intended to be used in such ways.

I guess I see a problem with both of these suggestions. First, how do you restore checks and balances? If the police refuse to comply with written instructions from a judge, what's supposed to happen? If the police refuse because the judge didn't use a particular form the police expect for a particular type of legal request, who settles the dispute? For that matter, who's supposed to take action to resolve the dispute?

I'd also point out that isn't really a question of checks and balances so much as trouble with inefficient communications.

Second, the problem with all law is that it's still written in English, which is not a formal language, free of all ambiguity. I mentioned in another thread that so-called "legalese" is usually about trying to make law more precise, so that it reduces the ambiguity of its meaning. But even then, there's often still room for interpretation, because legalese is still just technical English, and is therefore bound to include ambiguous elements.

For example, if you're going to ban "drunk driving" you have to come up with rigorous, objective standards for what constitutes being "drunk", and also what constitutes "driving". Is a separate law needed for boats and aircraft, for example? What about farm machinery? Is drunkenness determined by a test for impaired function, or by some sort of biochemical standard? In either case, you need to set a standard for what constitutes a valid test, how you verify the authenticity of the test, and how you document the test.

If the law defines "driving" as operating a gasoline-powered vehicle with 2 or 4 wheels, and someone is driving around with an ethanol-fueled car or a trike, should he be exempt from the law?

As for legal precedent, a lot of times that comes into play because the law was intentionally written to leave room for judges to make their own interpretation on the meaning of things that could never be exhaustively defined (e.g. "reasonable suspicion"). Over time you do start building up a more regular definition of "reasonable suspicion" by the way cases have been decided in the past, and so you'll find that the topic of precedent will naturally come up whenever a prosecutor or defense wants to challenge (or defend) the way one of those ambiguous standards was applied.

As for the way the courts tend to screw you if you try to file claims, I think part of that is because the court system is perpetually starved for resources, and they want to try to stave off frivolous lawsuits by making the process a pain in the ass.

>> ^GeeSussFreeK:

I remain cautiously agnostic for several reasons. I think mostly, though, is that it has never been sufficiency shown to my liking that warming temperatures are bad.

You should read up some more on the concept of climate change feedback. Ice and snow are more reflective than open ocean and land, if it all melts, it will make the planet warmer.

The polar caps are also known to have large bubbles of methane and CO2 in them, if the ice melts, they will be released into the atmosphere, adding to the warming effect.

As for government's involvement, what supposed small government people are prioritizing is making gas and electricity as cheap as possible, by trying to stop attempts to price carbon, limit pollution, and limit environmental risks by putting moratoriums on deep water drilling.

There is a big agribusiness lobby that pushes ethanol (whose environmental pluses are marginal to nonexistent), but there are much still much bigger subsidies for oil and coal.

Most environmentalists want to end the subsidies of oil and coal (and ethanol for that matter) and replace them with wind and solar subsidies -- and we're stopped by conservatives and corporatists screaming about how statist and tyrannical that would be because it would distort the market.

To really let the government get out of way, you need for the government to create a market for carbon and pollution credits and let the free market find the true price of environmental damage. Insisting that pollution should remain an unowned communal dumping ground is not a free market policy at all -- it's communism, plain and simple.

I remain cautiously agnostic for several reasons. I think mostly, though, is that it has never been sufficiency shown to my liking that warming temperatures are bad. Now, no one wants to become like Venus and have rivers of molten lead coursing by the house. But then again, what if 30% of the Russian permafrost melted and provided a farming area the size of 2 United States for the world? It seems more like a fear of change then a fear of anything rational. For example, the year after Katrina, they predicted no less than 4 category 5 hurricanes for the season. We didn't even have one category 4 that year. I think that was one of the main fear that I have heard about global warming is more extreme weather pattens, but I don't believe there is really any good evidence of this. Even when you look to the heavens at Jupiter and Neptune, you see extreme weather, but you see a very consistent pattern. So the argument is 2 fold for me. First I remain unconvinced that global climate has ever been truly stable, and second, that warmer temperatures are even bad.

With that said, I find pollution disgusting in its own right. Who likes smog, really! Who like finding wrappers (I misspelled this and almost left it rappers, lol) all over their town? Who likes getting sunburned because they punched a whole through the ozone? Pollution and general filth still concern me and I think we as individuals should try as best we can to change what we can. I think if you want rapid adoption of new clean technology, keep government out of it. Right now they are, once again, pushing pet programs like ethanol that are crazy ineffectual but have the backing of the corn lobby.

It was very interesting to me to see that they both talked about area footprint of wind/solar, but that their figures were *vastly* different. There are some fairly readily apparent things that contribute to that discrepancy, but not enough to account for it all in my opinion.

First, the pro-nuclear guy was presenting footprint for those resources supplying enough energy for the world's total need, whereas the anti-stance was talking only about powering transportation in the US.

Second, pro-nuclear included spacing and physical arrangement conditions into account for his footprint figures, while anti only considered the area of the base of the tower. I think both of those reporting methods have some useful data; as mentioned the spacing area around the tower bases can be used for agriculture or other production (although there is inconvenience costs associated with that), but there is also the physical reality that you can't cram all of those towers into a condensed area merely the size of their own footprint without the rotors colliding.

Those discrepancies in their arguments remind me of pro and anti ethanol talking points. I come from Kansas, and my family operates a farm that produces wheat and corn. Ten years ago, basically 100% of the corn production from my family's farm was sold to feedlots as food for cattle. About 5 years ago, an ethanol plant was built fairly close to our farmland, and so since then an average of roughly 50% has gone there instead (that figure changes a lot over time, but over a sum total of the past 5 years I figure 50% is ballpark). The remainder still goes to the beef industry. We determine who to sell corn to without any thought for pro/anti beef-ethanol advocacy, and just consider sale price minus self-delivery and other costs (shipping further costs more, etc.)

Anyway, the pro-ethanol people will butter you up with talk about "freeing ourselves from foreign oil", say that ethanol is better for the environment, etc. etc. The anti people write letters claiming that ethanol production is actually an energy-draining exercise -- that we use more energy to produce 1 unit of ethanol that we can gain from using that unit as fuel.

My uncle (basically the boss of the family farm) was interested in that claim so he decided to try to calculate it out, making best-guess estimates where necessary. What he came up with was that the anti-ethanol people were correct -- for the first 1-5 years of operation of an ethanol plant, and only if they include absolutely every expenditure of fuel even remotely associated with the production of the corn or other input AND the construction and operation of the plant itself. For example, including the diesel fuel consumption of every tractor, combine, irrigation wells/motors, etc. and suggesting that all of that consumption is entirely devoted to ethanol production; ie. that that fuel would not be used if the crop produced wasn't being turned into ethanol.

I didn't do the calculations myself, and I don't even really mean to suggest that I stand by them being correct. What I do think is relevant is that it shows that it is very very easy to present a fairly compelling argument for or against essentially anything by being selective about what data is included and how it is presented. This is particularly true for anything that involves large amounts of data and is fairly complex. So basically, while I *wish* that being honest, open, and thorough provided the best results in terms of winning a debate such as this, there is a lot to be said about the potential utility for massaging the data and preying on complexity and ignorance.

(Sorry for the long babble.)

If they can adapt it to run on liquid fuel sources then it could be big, especially if the efficiency rate is above 90%, the reason being that while ethanol might be hard to make effectivly, methanol could be made in huge quantities.

And this is why I truly hate mainstream media now... especially the 'mass market' shit.

We have a free 'newspaper' here in Melbourne called the MX, which is basically just a bunch of things also printed in the shlock newspaper The Herald Sun along with even more trite and ridiculous 'stories'.

What stopped me reading it mostly though was that every page has AT LEAST one 'study' that makes some bold new claim about how something we've been doing for years is bad for us/good for us/used to be thought of as bad, but is now good/will make us more attractive to opposite sex

And so on and so on.

Except they are such small and condensed snippets you can't get a hold on whether the science behind the study is good or whether the finding is correctly reported... AND even more often the case, you find that it's a 'study' paid for by some company with a vested interest 'Study says that more people are finding meaningful relationships online' (says study funded by online dating site. 'Study says that using mouthwash with ethanol not a danger as previously thought' (says study funded by Listerine) and so on and so on.

It's infuriating and makes people distrust science more and more.

Sad

Good discussion guys. I couldn't help but weigh in with my two cents. I think everyone here agrees that this is one issue we need to get right, as there's a lot of investment on the line. While I like most of the options mentioned, I have a preference for passive solar over photovoltaics, just because of the pollution concerns involved. These too can work on a local scale for water heaters, etc. Further, if implemented on a large scale in the southwestern US, it could power most of the country. Nuclear too is an option that should be expanded in the near term, and I don't think the NIMBY problem is as bad as you think. As my father said, in his opposition to the Cape Wind Project... "I'll live next door to a modern nuclear power plant, but those waters have better purposes." Frankly, the opposition to building new plants is just keeping older, unsafe plants online past their safely usable life. It's not like our workforce is busy doing much else right now, let's get building.

Personally I feel like it will become an issue of niche solutions for niche applications. The solution that locally make sense is the one that will be adopted. Rurally, especially in areas with little rainfall, it may be more logical to use your abundant resource, land, to generate your power. In higher density areas, this doesn't make as much sense. This brings up another big issue I thought I heard briefly mentioned which is distribution. HVDC cables, coupled with smart distribution grids leads to HUGE gains in efficiency of distribution. There were also a number of notable energy sources left out of this discussion, such as geothermal (where it applies), algal ethanol/petroleum (perhaps best for their implications on plastics), or, for the super crazy, orbiting solar plants beaming microwave power back to earth (Japan is actually researching this). Geothermal, for instance, may prove critical to reducing industrial emissions. Aluminum manufacturers have already begun using Icelandic geothermal as the refining process is extremely energy intensive, and the end product is quite transportable.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

Sure, nuclear reactors are expensive- but keep in mind that they've been sidelined in funding because they are NIMBY bogey man. Most of the problems you cite have been fixed in new model Thorium reactors (half-life is only 500 years, waste is small amount and they actually eat old types of nuclear waste for fuel!)

I'm not sure about that solar panel lifespan- I'm just going by someone I know who has them installed- it may have been the lead acid batteries that they had to swap out ever 5 years or so. Regardless, photovoltaic cell manufacture is a dirty fab process similar to chips- lots of toxic non-recyclable metals and burning a good deal of CO2.

I'm behind new-nuclear as a sensible stop-gap until fusion comes online.

.>> ^curiousity:
>> ^dag:
As far as efficiency goes, I'd take fission over solar.
The amount of square feet required to make solar energy as well as the material required for all of those panels- heavy metals and toxic chemicals- and a short equipment lifespan make them about as well thought-out as ethanol- which is to say not at all.
If we could get over our irrational nuclear fears- nuclear fission really is the best option for the planet in the short term, and then roll on the fusion when it gets here. 10 years right?

Much of the cost for fission reactors is hidden by government subsides. Cost is definitely a reason that there hasn't been a new nuclear reactor build in the US for over 30 years. They are damn expensive. And then the real cost comes with storage of radiated materials. A storage fee that will last a long time.
Last time I checked, most decent solar panels come with a 25-year warranty which means they might last 30 to 50 years if not damaged. There are also solar-based plants that focus sunlight to heat water to drive turbines - much more efficient that current solar panel technology. I can't compare solar energy to ethanol in good faith.