You can see it in operation in Niagara Falls. During periods of low electric power demand, water is pumped into a large reservoir; when power demand goes up, water from the reservoir passes through the pumps, now operating as generators.
Kodak nuclear reactor in basement!
-
A
- Thread starter munz6869
- Start date
Recent Classifieds
-
For Sale Beseler 8053 35mm Negative Carrier for the 23C models
- Started by mgb74
-
For Sale NIKON 20mm f/2.8 AF-D
- Started by Acere
-
Sold Coolscan 4000/5000 MA-21 Slide mount adapter (free)
- Started by RoboRepublic
-
For Sale Nikon Fm2n w/50mm 1.8
- Started by Acere
-
For Sale FS: Hansa 6x9 Wooden Field Camera
- Started by B.S.Kumar
Forum statistics
You can see it in operation in Niagara Falls. During periods of low electric power demand, water is pumped into a large reservoir; when power demand goes up, water from the reservoir passes through the pumps, now operating as generators.
My god, Archimedes has gotta be laughing up at us.
Where the heck have you been, PE? The Flux Capacitor... duhh!!
That is for time travel, not for energy storage! Sheesh!
PE
PE
What's the difference?? Energy is energy!!
So, the Kodak reactor. It was for Neutron Activation Analysis, i.e. finding impurities.
Well, the Chinese are already mass-producing comparably cheap and long lasting lithium-ion battery chemistries such as LiFePO4 that do not use any inherently expensive materials. They are still high in price because the technology has been there for just a few years. I personally believe those will be going down in price quickly, but of course that may just be my unrealistic hope as I'm planning an EV conversion. But I cannot see why they would remain expensive. Lithium is quite abundant and easy to recycle, and the Chinese have a HUGE EV market. They are converting their buses, for example.
Then, lithium sulfur batteries seem to be the "next thing" with a doubled or tripled energy density. The latest innovations on the battery field have been around solving the degradation problems of LiS. If LiS could be made to the same cycle durability as LiFePO4 without expensive or hazardous materials, that would be really sensational.
Today's electric cars can hold about 40 kWh in their batteries and drive about 200 km, and this kind of battery pack currently costs about $15000. It has been estimated that a simultaneous doubling in capacity and halving in price are needed to bring them to wide use and this may be seen in next 15 years. Technology is mostly there already, and, most importantly, motivation is there. When this happens, then we also get a huge distributed energy storage system as a side product. This is a great synergy, because the cars are needed ANYWAY, and due to a high cost of gasoline, electric cars are ALREADY taking off a little even given the current batteries.
Pumped hydropower is a very simple and efficient energy storage, but it doesn't work everywhere; the suitable geography is needed.
Last edited by a moderator:
That is actually a pretty active avenue of research right now. They have solutions for short term current demands (like starting a car), but getting a more sustained and controlled release of the energy is problematic.
Ed
Capacitors have progressed HUGELY and are already used in electric vehicles to provide very high power for short peaks to some extent. The issue still lies in fact that the capacity/weight ratio is far from batteries. Something like 10% compared to batteries. Which, for a capacitor, is still something remarkable. Formerly, it has been something around 0,1 - 1 % compared to batteries. An another issue is that if you want any usable capacity/weight or capacity/price ratio, you need a very high power switch mode regulator to adjust the voltage, as the voltage discharge curve goes linearly down; in batteries, the discharge curve is almost straight line and drops suddenly when the battery is empty.
I agree! That is why I said that someone should invent a good capacitor.
PE
PE
I suspect in the future we'll see a combination of (cheap, low-power (e.g. 2C), energy-dense) Li cells for cruising and MAYBE some capacitors to handle peak current at start/stop. I've been looking at building an electric clubman and if you buy the cells direct from china you can get a pack for about $10k with enough energy+power for serious acceleration (0-100 in 5s) and a range of 200km+. Probably $15k once you include motor-control and charging electronics. Then go have a look at the price of commercial PMDC motors coming out of the RC-model world; they're under $30/kW for decent sizes which means a pretty cheap, yet epic drivetrain.
High efficiency equals low profit and that doesn't support a pyramid fiat economy. It'll never happen unless we do it ourselves on an individual basis.
I think we are seeing this drive back to small and medium-sized businesses after a century of giants. In fact, those giants usually have very low "efficiency", whereas it is more natural to have smaller businesses; it simply starts by "doing it ourselves" and then expand. Those giants have also started this way, so it is natural that the cycle starts over every now and then. Many industrial giants were started in 1900-1950 and now many of them are in weak state. They are speaking about recession, but that's only a symptom; the cause is elsewhere. Do they have anything to offer like they had in history? Especially, do their products and services justify their huge corporational expenses that go up all the time, anymore?
Currently, we have got so used to the giants that the phrase "we have to do it by ourselves" has an interesting "DIY" tinge to it, even though in reality everything is done by us, the people who are interested in doing these things. Serving a huge corporate bureaucracy that will suck at least two thirds of the resources is nothing absolutely necessary. Ford became big by inventing cheap car. Kodak became big by inventing film. These all started from a real need as relative small businesses with a really new product to sell. Now the big companies won't do electric cars or battery R&D unless they ABSOLUTELY need to. If they did want to do that, with their technical resources, we would have been driving electric cars for 30-40 years at least.
You can expand that for film. If there is (were) a REAL need for Kodachrome, then Kodachrome will (would) be reinvented by someone other than Kodak, simply because given enough mass of people, there will inevitably be enough of those capable of doing that. I just have a feeling that the drive for electric vehicles is a bit higher than for Kodachrome
.
The giants simply have keys to make certain processes go a bit faster and hold up some other processes for a while.
Currently, we have got so used to the giants that the phrase "we have to do it by ourselves" has an interesting "DIY" tinge to it, even though in reality everything is done by us, the people who are interested in doing these things. Serving a huge corporate bureaucracy that will suck at least two thirds of the resources is nothing absolutely necessary. Ford became big by inventing cheap car. Kodak became big by inventing film. These all started from a real need as relative small businesses with a really new product to sell. Now the big companies won't do electric cars or battery R&D unless they ABSOLUTELY need to. If they did want to do that, with their technical resources, we would have been driving electric cars for 30-40 years at least.
You can expand that for film. If there is (were) a REAL need for Kodachrome, then Kodachrome will (would) be reinvented by someone other than Kodak, simply because given enough mass of people, there will inevitably be enough of those capable of doing that. I just have a feeling that the drive for electric vehicles is a bit higher than for Kodachrome
.The giants simply have keys to make certain processes go a bit faster and hold up some other processes for a while.
Last edited by a moderator:
OTOH, if there is no market for something, or that "something" is expensive or hard to make, then it will never come to be. Kodachrome is an example.
PE
PE
...or if there is a low cost alternative that offers an attractive option. Some people here may not like the 'D' word, but a large part of the picture taking market finds it attractive. They didn't stop making horse driven buggies when the auto took over the personal transportation market, but the volume sure dropped; but buggies are relatively simple to make without fancy machines.
'Fancy' films may be in trouble. BTW, I hope they won't be, because I'm stlil a big believer that the best archiving medium for D images is film.
What I don't understand is the talk about installing "batteries" to store electric energy from peak production hours to peak consumption hours, on a national grid level. Wouldn't that require huge installations, with huge costs?
Besides, batteries age. Even in an electric car the battery pack must be substituted every few years. I expect performances to be declining during the years of use. How can that be applied to electric energy?
I ask this because there are talks, here in Italy, about adapting the distribution network to the new needs caused by the huge increase in small intermittent plants (solar, wind) which causes several problems, notably that conventional power stations have now to run for shorter periods of time, with shorter notice, and much higher costs. As far as I can gather, there is talk about solving the problem with some sort of accumulators.
Seems economically (and possibly ecologically) infeasible at first glance to a layman like me.
Fabrizio
Besides, batteries age. Even in an electric car the battery pack must be substituted every few years. I expect performances to be declining during the years of use. How can that be applied to electric energy?
I ask this because there are talks, here in Italy, about adapting the distribution network to the new needs caused by the huge increase in small intermittent plants (solar, wind) which causes several problems, notably that conventional power stations have now to run for shorter periods of time, with shorter notice, and much higher costs. As far as I can gather, there is talk about solving the problem with some sort of accumulators.
Seems economically (and possibly ecologically) infeasible at first glance to a layman like me.
Fabrizio
The Seneca Power Station at Kinzua Dam near Warren, PA is essentially a storage battery for electricity... without using batteries. It uses hydroelectric power derived from water pumped from the dam during off-peak hours.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seneca_Pumped_Storage_Generating_Station
Regarding nuclear power safety... there doesn't seem to be much talk about the coal power plant explosion in Japan at the same time that send radioactive coal dust everywhere. Because everyone is "hurr durr nuclear bad".
Well the alternative is mostly coal power for a lot of us, and that is radioactive, but with no protection! Deaths are a natural part of coal power production when it's operating normally, let alone the long term affects when a coal power disaster happens. Not to mention the air pollution you get from being anywhere near coal power (or almost anywhere in the country in China). Studies even show that coal ash is more radioactive than nuclear waste. But also has a shit tonne of other problems associated with it.
Deaths due to nuclear power is only when something goes wrong!
No, let's not not use nuclear power, let's just stick with coal for a long time to come (before anything else that can completely replace all power demands comes along).
Well the alternative is mostly coal power for a lot of us, and that is radioactive, but with no protection! Deaths are a natural part of coal power production when it's operating normally, let alone the long term affects when a coal power disaster happens. Not to mention the air pollution you get from being anywhere near coal power (or almost anywhere in the country in China). Studies even show that coal ash is more radioactive than nuclear waste. But also has a shit tonne of other problems associated with it.
Deaths due to nuclear power is only when something goes wrong!
No, let's not not use nuclear power, let's just stick with coal for a long time to come (before anything else that can completely replace all power demands comes along).
Yes I knew that. I meant chemical accumulators. Italy has got "plenty" of hydroelectric power stations which are also used as accumulator of potential energy, but it's basically infeasible to build new ones (for environmental and social reasons). Hence the talk about "real batteries" on a national grid level which finds me quite surprised.
Double mess
I really like the idea of pumped storage hydroelectric generation. I think it is a smart idea. The idea of chemical batteries is interesting but I wonder about the environmental cost of batteries versus pumped storage.
First, both are net consumers of power. There are costs associated with pumping water uphill and there are costs associated with losses in batteries. Batteries might come out ahead. However, I wonder about the environmental cost of making batteries out of (toxic?) chemicals then keeping them contained during use as opposed to the environmental cost of building reservoirs. Then there is the cost of replacing worn out batteries versus maintenance on dams and reservoirs.
I imagine that pumped hydroelectric storage might come out ahead in the long run. I don't know. I'd have to look it up but that's my guess.
As for nuclear power versus coal and gas, we still do basically the same thing: We boil water. That water is turned into steam which turns generators. The inefficiencies in the generation process are the same for both. In the end, it comes down to the question of which fuel source is better.
Is nuclear power safer than coal? In the short term, I think not but, in the long term, I think nuclear comes out ahead because, as stated above, burning coal produces pollution that is as bad or worse than the potential of pollution from nuclear fuel. We have to either dispose of nuclear fuel or learn how to recycle it. We have to worry about disasters which would release radiation into the environment but those problems are essentially point-source events. If a problem happens, it happens all at once and has great consequences in the short term. With coal, we don't have to worry so much about short-term disasters but, long term pollution costs might outstrip the superficial benefits.
Again, I don't know for sure but I guess that nuclear power comes out ahead in the long run, provided we accept the caveat that we have to be really freakin' careful. One false move and we've got troubles, Bubbles!
At the end, I come down on the side of pro-nuclear with serious consideration of that caveat. I don't think we know everything we need to know about keeping nuclear power safe and making it better but I think that's because so many people react with knee-jerk fear of it. I think we should hold the line on what nuclear power we have. Don't forge ahead to build more but don't get rid of the plants that are operating now. We should use them to learn from and help us build better ones.
As I said, I hate it when people seem to say that nuclear power is SO BAD that we can't even do research on it. I stipulate that it can be bad but I believe that is the very reason why we should study it. To find out how to keep it from being so bad.
Secondarily, I have always felt that using nuclear reactors to make steam is a waste. Isn't there a way to harness the nuclear reaction to produce electricity directly? I know that there is, in theory, but nobody has figured out how to do it on a sustained level. It would be really cool if we could but, to do that, we need research.
In the mean time, what's the next best thing to coal or nuclear? Hydro is at the top of the list. Isn't it?
Wind, wave and solar are next, after that but I don't think they'll ever be a solution for the long term because you can never count on them being a constant source of power even if you connect the generators into giant grids. Wind is just too unstable. The sun isn't constant and seas can be calm one day and be raging torrents the next. I think they are good ADJUNCTS to our power solution but not the solution by themselves.
That brings us back to coal, hydro and nuclear.
I think we should hold the line on coal: No more but no less. (Unless we absolutely have to build more.) I think we should supplement our coal power with hydro power. I think we should learn to build better nuclear plants then, finally, fill in the gaps with wind, wave and solar power.
Back to the topic sentence: I think pumped storage is in the same department as wind, wave and solar. It's not practical for the long term but as an adjunct, it's good. I think it also might make a good research tool, as well. (i.e. How to build better generators and pumps that are better and more efficient.)
Batteries? Sure I think they'll work but for the long term? I think they are at the bottom of the list.
First, both are net consumers of power. There are costs associated with pumping water uphill and there are costs associated with losses in batteries. Batteries might come out ahead. However, I wonder about the environmental cost of making batteries out of (toxic?) chemicals then keeping them contained during use as opposed to the environmental cost of building reservoirs. Then there is the cost of replacing worn out batteries versus maintenance on dams and reservoirs.
I imagine that pumped hydroelectric storage might come out ahead in the long run. I don't know. I'd have to look it up but that's my guess.
As for nuclear power versus coal and gas, we still do basically the same thing: We boil water. That water is turned into steam which turns generators. The inefficiencies in the generation process are the same for both. In the end, it comes down to the question of which fuel source is better.
Is nuclear power safer than coal? In the short term, I think not but, in the long term, I think nuclear comes out ahead because, as stated above, burning coal produces pollution that is as bad or worse than the potential of pollution from nuclear fuel. We have to either dispose of nuclear fuel or learn how to recycle it. We have to worry about disasters which would release radiation into the environment but those problems are essentially point-source events. If a problem happens, it happens all at once and has great consequences in the short term. With coal, we don't have to worry so much about short-term disasters but, long term pollution costs might outstrip the superficial benefits.
Again, I don't know for sure but I guess that nuclear power comes out ahead in the long run, provided we accept the caveat that we have to be really freakin' careful. One false move and we've got troubles, Bubbles!
At the end, I come down on the side of pro-nuclear with serious consideration of that caveat. I don't think we know everything we need to know about keeping nuclear power safe and making it better but I think that's because so many people react with knee-jerk fear of it. I think we should hold the line on what nuclear power we have. Don't forge ahead to build more but don't get rid of the plants that are operating now. We should use them to learn from and help us build better ones.
As I said, I hate it when people seem to say that nuclear power is SO BAD that we can't even do research on it. I stipulate that it can be bad but I believe that is the very reason why we should study it. To find out how to keep it from being so bad.
Secondarily, I have always felt that using nuclear reactors to make steam is a waste. Isn't there a way to harness the nuclear reaction to produce electricity directly? I know that there is, in theory, but nobody has figured out how to do it on a sustained level. It would be really cool if we could but, to do that, we need research.
In the mean time, what's the next best thing to coal or nuclear? Hydro is at the top of the list. Isn't it?
Wind, wave and solar are next, after that but I don't think they'll ever be a solution for the long term because you can never count on them being a constant source of power even if you connect the generators into giant grids. Wind is just too unstable. The sun isn't constant and seas can be calm one day and be raging torrents the next. I think they are good ADJUNCTS to our power solution but not the solution by themselves.
That brings us back to coal, hydro and nuclear.
I think we should hold the line on coal: No more but no less. (Unless we absolutely have to build more.) I think we should supplement our coal power with hydro power. I think we should learn to build better nuclear plants then, finally, fill in the gaps with wind, wave and solar power.
Back to the topic sentence: I think pumped storage is in the same department as wind, wave and solar. It's not practical for the long term but as an adjunct, it's good. I think it also might make a good research tool, as well. (i.e. How to build better generators and pumps that are better and more efficient.)
Batteries? Sure I think they'll work but for the long term? I think they are at the bottom of the list.
Fusion! That is the answer. Or, the Casimir effect which brings us back to capacitors in a way..
PE
PE
I think answer would be thorium reactors , they are safe and Türkiye have %85 of worlds total thorium mines. No need to fill the stadiums with neodymium door sized laser glass slabs.
There are many news about capacitors but I dont know why they dissappear from the scene later.
I think the answer of oil industry secret is the main source of richness of US is based on shit loaded arabians money. Sweet money , with oil , US controls arabs and world , lets say oil is geopolitical thing.
I think We will never change anything until 2150 when the oil finishes.
There are many news about capacitors but I dont know why they dissappear from the scene later.
I think the answer of oil industry secret is the main source of richness of US is based on shit loaded arabians money. Sweet money , with oil , US controls arabs and world , lets say oil is geopolitical thing.
I think We will never change anything until 2150 when the oil finishes.
PE is right when he suggests fusion.
It's what powers the universe and the fuel for it is hydrogen. Our oceans have enough hydrogen to support fusion for billions of years even at extravagant consumption rates. The "ash" is helium and there is no long term nuclear waste. Every country in the world has more than enough supplies. The stuff can't be weaponised. All the basic science has been well understood for decades. Controlled fusion has been done hundreds of times in laboratories.
All that is required is to solve some engineering problems so that the energy coming out exceeds the energy put in. A concerted effort, perhaps not even as big as the Manhattan project, could solve human energy demand forever. The obstacles ultimately are political and financial.
| Photrio.com contains affiliate links to products. We may receive a commission for purchases made through these links. To read our full affiliate disclosure statement please click Here. |
PHOTRIO PARTNERS EQUALLY FUNDING OUR COMMUNITY:  |