eFuel?!

[troy]

ADVRider shared this interview today. It is very interesting even if you don't understand the science. Gives me some hope for the future.

https://youtu.be/y6iQlkUXUsE

[xr-nut]

How long until hillary gets this guy to protect her big oil buddies?

[safiri]

I've watched the first 10 minutes of the video. Good so far.

I've talked with my high school science and automotive students about this possibility for years. Most of the technology has existed for a while, it's just getting it to the point it can work on a macro scale.

Efficiency (not conservation) and technology have been, and will be, the driving forces as energy becomes more expensive. Conservation asks me to give up something ... most aren't willing. Efficiency alllows me to get the same result for lower cost. Technology, specifically fracking, has allowed the tapping of what were hard-to-get oil and natural gas. Once those reserves are depleted, we will probably be facing much higher energy prices. Unless new technologies are developed.

[troy]

I was hoping you'd watch the video and comment, science-nerd safiri!

Conservation asks me to give up something ... most aren't willing. Efficiency allows me to get the same result for lower cost.

Reminds me of
Reduce | Reuse | Recycle

Most people don't even know what that 1st word is! I think many also think "If I throw this into the recycle bin, it's a net-zero." Dream on.

As for energy costs, I think he is really only focused on solar energy for this process, and states that it is the low cost of solar that finally makes this viable.

They plan to sell the fuel for $0.01 less than the cost of normal fuel. He suggests they can be profitable at that cost, but can they really? That price might be more of a subsidized price using investor dollars to buy the volume as they get this thing going. That is a very common strategy for startups in order to gain enough momentum to break the chicken & egg conundrum. "We could afford to sell the fuel for X per gallon if we could sell Y volume....but we can't reach Y volume without offering X price to the market. Let's spend a few million dollars to keep the price low while we get to Y volume."

[safiri]

As for energy costs, I think he is really only focused on solar energy for this process, and states that it is the low cost of solar that finally makes this viable.

They plan to sell the fuel for $0.01 less than the cost of normal fuel. He suggests they can be profitable at that cost, but can they really? That price might be more of a subsidized price using investor dollars to buy the volume as they get this thing going. That is a very common strategy for startups in order to gain enough momentum to break the chicken & egg conundrum. "We could afford to sell the fuel for X per gallon if we could sell Y volume....but we can't reach Y volume without offering X price to the market. Let's spend a few million dollars to keep the price low while we get to Y volume."

Too often we don't include the (often hidden) long-term costs when pricing something. Is the true cost of a gallon of gasoline what we pay at the pump? I think the actual cost is far higher.

Continuing down the road of extracting sequestered carbon and pumping it into the atmosphere has seriously large future costs that aren't included in the cost at the pump. Many economists / climatologists think we are already seeing those costs in terms of more frequent extreme climate variability events: more frequent and longer hurricane seasons, more tornadoes, longer / more extreme droughts, more frequent floods, risiing sea levels, etc. "Glabal warming" referred to the macro warming of the oceans and the Earth. As that warming leads to climate variability extremes on the local (micro) level, the name was changed to "climate change" to more accurately describe what an individual will experience. Think of all of the US population that lives and works within a few feet of sea level.

To tie this into your other post on farming and government subsidies, one of those subsidies is the government subsidizing what farmers pay for crop insurance. The insurance is offered through private companies, but the governtment provides the "reinsurance" as well as the subsidy. As extremes in weather increase, the cost of this insurance will have to increase as well in order to cover costs. That will be an increased cost to the government / taxpayer. I believe the government also reinsures flood insurance. Again those flood events will increase. If/when the desert SW doesn't have enough water, the government will certainly step in ... pipelines, moving people, buying out farms, etc. Consider, too, the feds paid for Hoover Dam and Glen Canyon Dam in the first place which created the "subsidized" water that allowed the desert SW to flourish, both in agricultural production as well as population.

off to stir the pot elsewhere ...

[troy]

...and this is why I love riding my dirt bike. It is one of the only activities I engage in where I am fully engaged. When I'm picking a line through a nasty obstacle, I am not thinking about climate change, politics, mask mandates, how I'm going to pay for healthcare, or that task I'm dreading that is due next week.

Ignorance is bliss. #truth