Water Now More Awesome Than Previously Thought 708
Dan writes "Wired has a great article about a guy who thinks we can provide unlimited energy , accelerate crop growth, desalinize and purify drinking water, obtain health benefits and provide air conditioning, all by pumping up water from the depths of the ocean."
Re:More Efficient Coastal Farming (Score:2, Insightful)
Good, but... (Score:1, Insightful)
Deep Sea Environment? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Like all energy sources.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:This is fantastic! (Score:3, Insightful)
The "limitless energy" claim is pure hype, but just ignore that bit.
As you point out, it is also important to evaluate the long term affects of removing significant amounts of cold water from the oceans (disrupting ocean currents, overall water temp. rises, etc). The drinking water generator would also lower the air humidity, which would cause problems if the project was done on a wide scale.
I am sure this technology has applications in some circumstances (perhaps on oil rigs, remote islands, etc), but it is certainly not the solution to all our energy problems. Done on a large scale it would be unsustainable.
I'm still waiting for practical fusion power...
Re:Like all energy sources.... (Score:1, Insightful)
perpetuum mobile? (Score:2, Insightful)
I guess the energy you need to pump up the water would be provided by the same water - not.
I have no [...] pain of any kind!
Pain-free! Guess that explains it...
Re:This is fantastic! (Score:5, Insightful)
Er, no, not really. Granted, this particular guy sounds a few gallons short of a hogshead, but deriving useable energy from cooling things off works exactly the same way as by heating them up - Namely, we can use the transfer of energy from the warmer side to the colder side to perform useful work (such as generating electricity). The absolute temperatures involves don't particularly matter.
So why do virtually all human-created energy extraction technologies use warmer than ambient going to ambient as the two sides? Simple... We humans have enjoyed, at least for the past few millenia, a really easy way to get things hot (ie, fire and a supply of fuel that literally grows on (as?) trees). We have not had a convenient way of making something colder-than-ambient, except very recently (within the past century), and even then only by using the hot-to-ambient conversion to get electricity to do the ambient-to-cold conversion - Sort of trading one for the other, with a net loss in both conversions.
Deep ocean water, however, provides exactly that - A nearly limitless supply of something colder than ambient, with a high enough specific heat that the energy we can extract from the temperature gradient FAR exceeds the energy needed to pump it in the first place.
Imagine the climactic effects, and effects on the oceans ecosystems
Now, here you make a good point. In the short term, or on a small scale, I would tend to say that we couldn't even come close to the natural processes that mix the oceans. But then, people thought the same about burning wood and later oil, until just the past few decades.
Re:Like all energy sources.... (Score:2, Insightful)
First, that doesn't make sense (even if you had spelled thermodynamics properly).
Second, get an introductory physics textbook and see how much energy we would have to remove from the oceans to lower its temperature by say 0.01 degrees. It's a lot.
Re:More Efficient Coastal Farming (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe I've forgotten too much of my highschool physics, but how does this really work? I was under the impression that the "sweat" on cold pipes is the result of the chilling of the surrounding air/material, which lowers its capacity for carrying water, thus in essence extracting it into solid form.
So if the pipes sweat below ground, aren't they simply solidifying water that already is in the ground? If so, that's not what I'd call irrigation...
Electricity generation? (Score:2, Insightful)
Thanks
Re:This is fantastic! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:More Efficient Coastal Farming (Score:5, Insightful)
That's a goodly majority of all humanity.
C//
Re:very low thermal efficiency (Score:5, Insightful)
A 2% efficiency isn't a problem. Efficiency tells you the ratio of the energy you can sell to the energy you put in. But if the energy you put in costs zero, then efficiency is an utterly unimportant number.
What's more relevant is to compare the cost of building the plant to the money you can make by running the plant over its planned lifetime. That's the relevant figure of merit for a nuclear power plant, and I think it's the relevant one for an OTEC plant as well.
The problem is that fossil fuels are artificially subsidized. Say I increase my energy use, and use an extra megajoule of energy derived from burning coal or gasoline. Well, I don't pay anything extra for the damage I'm doing with global warming, and I also don't pay enything extra for all the wars in the Middle East that the U.S. keeps getting into.
Re:Like all energy sources.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Previous examples of the attitude you express: whaling, fishing, logging, hunting, burning fossil fuels, and of course, the classic, oil. In case your history is rusty, in all these cases people just assumed the capacity of nature was limitless. Then one day they woke up and realised the world had changed for the worse.
The system would have definite points of extraction, therefore you have to consider local effects. You can't just calculate the energy of the whole ocean and then say, "we are only taking 1%, so it must be OK". If you are taking 1% of all the ocean's energy from 0.1% of its volume you are going to cause serious problems.
But it's not just a power plant (Score:5, Insightful)
There are several factors that make up for the inefficiency in power generation:
Places like Saudi Arabia and Chile, which have lots of sun and salt water, but almost no fresh water, should jump on this. Saudi Arabia in particular, which has all the power it needs, could really benefit.
Re:More Efficient Coastal Farming (Score:4, Insightful)
As is the case in this pilot project, the hardest up locations for resources are often islands so initially this may be a viable solution.
Then consider how fast the Pacific drops off near Monteray CA. Consider Japan, Korea, Indonesia, east coast of India...turn on the satelite view in google maps and see how many populated coasts are near continental shelf drop-offs.
Re:Some of his ideas are nuts (Score:3, Insightful)
Conventional wisdom is an oxymoron. It also tells us that, e.g., tomato juice gets rid of skunk oil. (It doesn't; it just overloads the nose so you can't smell it.)
Having worked one summer in a fish packing plant, I can attest that people do in fact hurt very much after spending 8 hours working with cold water...
Well, yes. Prolonged exposure to cold water isn't good for the body. That still doesn't mean chilling is never good.
With regards to the rest, though, I do agree and question whether this would be a real "free energy" situation, or if he just plans to be dead by the time the maintenance issues have really added up. There may be some ways to limit the effects of corrosion(different materials that aren't as strongly affected by salt, e.g. plastics instead of metal wherever feasible), but it's still going to take its toll; and even a siphon would probably need some help to keep going on this scale.
The nutrient problem, however, is very large. Not just the matter of keeping the intake clear, but that dumping that sort of water at the surface is going to cause complications; the chemistry is entirely different.
speeding up plant growth cycles?? (Score:3, Insightful)
in all seriousness, a cool way to get fresh water and possibly some electricity out of it, if the efficiency problems can be solved. fresh water is scarce enough of a resource as it is.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:very low thermal efficiency (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:More Efficient Coastal Farming (Score:1, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Dihydrogen Monoxide (Score:3, Insightful)
You don't enumerate singular atoms in inorganic molecules. The proper term is dihydrogen oxide.
Re:More Efficient Coastal Farming (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:ocean temperatures? (Score:4, Insightful)
No, discharging sewage into the ocean can have unintended effects. That's the real problem.
Re:I see a flaw. (Score:4, Insightful)
Insulate the pipe?
Cold water is MORE DENSE than warm water. In fact the point of maximum density is about 4 degrees C, below that it gets less dense again (unlike most substances). But I didn't see the article mention the actual temperature of the water that's being extracted here, so maybe it is sub-4.
My concern is, what if the pipe sucks up all these exotic bottom-dwelling fish?
Re:More Efficient Coastal Farming (Score:3, Insightful)
Wouldn't it be interesting if tiny little islands in the Carribean and South Pacific become the Saudi Arabias of the future.
Don't forget geothermal energy. Iceland is already investing heavilly into hydrogen production. Also, having cars run on hydrogen means not only that you've moved the pollution problem. You've centralized it. It'd be easier to build very efficient and relatively low polluting large plants than increase the effectiveness of every siingle car.
Only one glitch: not economical by a long way. (Score:3, Insightful)
With that small a difference it's doubtful you can generate enough power to break-even. After all, you have to run the pumps to pump up the cold water. That's not a trivial amount of energy-- water is heavy and it's waaay down there.
I'm too lazy to do the spreadsheet math right now, but a rough estimate says you can't even break even on the energy, even with an ideal turbine using some ideal working fluid that vaporizes at just the right temperature.
And any economically viable scheme has to not only be above break-even, it has to generate enough benefits to pay for the equipment and labor. Have you priced the cost of a 5,000 foot long sewer pipe recently? How's about a turbine that can extract useful power from a 40 degree F difference? Yowsa.
Re:More Efficient Coastal Farming (Score:2, Insightful)
Actually, as has been stated in the article, you don't need any (significant) amount of energy to get the water from the bottom to the surface either, because basically the same principle applies. You do not need to overcome gravity (because pressure at the bottom exactly compensates for this), but only friction.
Probably the real reason why they have two circuits is to avoid "dirty" lakewater gumming up their AC units.
Re:More Efficient Coastal Farming (Score:3, Insightful)
if you add what americans pay PRIVATELY for their health care to their tax bill - wait for it -- they become the most taxed people on earth.
canadians arent taxed much really, consider what we recieve in return.
amoung other things, universal healthcare of dubious quality and value
nonsense. The care is excellent. I refer you to the 100% coverage, illness rates, infant mortality rates and life expectancy. Anactodal testimony that the system 'has too many waits' is mcdonalds-mall-shopping mindset where it isnt necessary. guess what: sometimes you have to wait. in the end, the only result is you couldnt cope with not being able to demand instant attention... which is really what the immature/uneducated are using as motivation to insult CHC.
For what my father paid in that share of his taxes earmarked for national health care, his life could have been saved ten times over. Instead, an operable, discovered abdominal aortic aneurism was left untreated until it ruptured, killing him.
Im sorry for your loss. But unfortunatley, some people die. Blaming your father on CHC is dubious. One person's loss isnt reason to consider the system broken. We are dealing with a massive system. Its got to be flexible but efficient.
In the end, its still provides excellent care. There is no disputing this.
But, why is it that Canada punishes traditional marriage and home ownership with its tax code?
For welfare bums, perhaps. But certainly not for hardworking breadwinners: mothers and fathers struggling to put a roof over their kids' heads.
Get off the fraser institute/reform mailing list. Youve fallen off the deep end. Those "welfare bums" you speak of are the middle class pal. Fostering the middle class -- or the general welfare -- is should be the sole goal of government.
Is your alternative the american-style gap between rich and poor and its accompanying chaos? no thanks.
Almost all of industrialized world has a social welfare system similar to Canada. Japan, australia, europe etc etc etc. *THIS* is why we have high standards of living -- by definition.
America has a high standard of living because of its massive income... being at the top of the financial shitpile has its advantages (like being able to spend yourself onto the point of respecable OL-index), but their system is *NOT* a model to emulate.
It *WILL* not work for anyone but the super rich. And, really, unless your superwealthy (ie: not middle class) than your self-interest is not served by wanting the changes you think you do.
Its american jingo rhetoric infecting your politics pal. its time for some perspective. Take a trip to europe. read some foriegn papers.
Re:More Efficient Coastal Farming (Score:2, Insightful)
As to generating fresh water, they're sucking moisture out of the air.
Something about this bothers me though. If you suck the moisture out of the air aren't you in essence denying the atmosphere the moisture necessary to form clouds and produce the rain that runs your botanical irrigation system.
It'll be interesting to see what happens when this goes into large scale operation.
Re:More Efficient Coastal Farming (Score:3, Insightful)
And around 20% of the population, or higher in some places, and continually rising every year regardless of geography, has apparently "chose" the "option" of no health care at all because its so expensive. Yea, nice "choice" there. It just creates a vicious cycle, where the uninsured increase costs for the insured to the point where the insured at the lower end can't afford their insurance anymore. I'm afraid the point you've missed is that our system is fatally injured, its just that given the size of our population its going to take a while for it to bleed to death.
There's a threshold, based on the percentage of uninsured, at which our current health system will simply collapse. No one knows where the threshold is, but we know we're approaching it. Its the health system's equivalent of "Peak Oil". Peak Health. The point at which the insured become such a relatively small group compared to the uninsured that the costs of the uninsured result in runaway inflation within the health care system. Its either that or this society must decide to let the uninsured die on the sidewalks outside of hospitals if they can't pay. We may not even recognize it until we hit it, but when we hit it, everyone will know, because everyone but the very rich will suffer during the meltdown.
I'm no fan of big government either, but this isn't a problem where one solution wears a white hat, and all the other solutions are sporting black Stetsons. The real world is never as simple as some in Hollywood and Washington would have you believe.
You can ignore me because its now "only" 20% or so, I'm just one voice in a cacophony, and the Mod Mafia jackasses on
Re:More Efficient Coastal Farming (Score:3, Insightful)
On top of that, the furthest it would need to go is around 1500 miles (It's about 1800 miles from Los Angeles to North Dakota, and that could be cut down by starting in Washington), so I would think that, while it would be a hell of a project, it is within the realm of current engineering. Doing something like this across the US might be really good for the country.
- It would get us largely off of fossil fuels for electricity generation.
- Coupled with hydrogen fuel cell cars, we could bankrupt the middle east in a few years.
- Much like Rossevelt's "New Deal" this could be a good way for the US government to kick-start the economy. The scope of this project would require a lot of skilled and unskilled labor, it would get money moving.
- Once the infrastructure was complete, this should bring the cost of electricity down. And, if we are using hydrogen cars by then, the cost of transportation would go down. Giving a boost to the buying power of the people.
- Over the long term, this project would provide a large number of jobs running and maintaing the system, which should absorb any job losses from other electricity industries.
- To use today's buzzwords: this would increase American enegry independence, improving national security
- For places, like the mojave desert, where water is scarce, this system could be used to provide drinking water.
Overall, this type of technology could be very good for the US, but since it would be very bad for the oil and power generation industries, it might as well be considered dead in the US now.