Renewable Energy Congress.

The Renewable Energy Congress held it's meeting in Denver this year, and today it was free to any student or teacher.
I was somewhat dissapointed, expecting there to be more information and groups centered around alternative fuels - so I wore a tee shirt reading "I (heart) Alcohol" - I think everybody just thought that I was an alcoholic.
I did have a discussion about Alcohol as a better fuel than Hydrogen though, and about how the oil companies destroyed the alcohol fuel industry in the United States (through ways both legitimate, and otherwise), and then went on to wreak havoc elsewhere (especially in South America, where their actions just plain disgust me).
Not to mention the hold the middle east now has over the entire world's economy, but for all I care they can keep all their damn oil - I'm building a still.
So I learned some stuff about windfarms and solar energy, and biodiesel. As it turns out, this is year is the 50th anniversary of the invention of the solar cell, so there was an exhibit containing the original solar cell produced at Bell Laboratories in 1954, as well as the first solar cell put to practical use, and a model of the first satellite to use solar power.
The only thing that really interested me was an incredible air conditioner that is truly an air conditioner using the evaporative method of cooling that is not a swamp cooler - rather than passing the air through a wick full of water and humidifying it, it has a real heat exchanger made from plastic and paper that works surprisingly effectively (the demonstartion model on hand took 135 degree air from a space heater and cooled it to 68 degress) without adding any humidity to the cooled air, or even having the air actually contact the water at all. I was surprised to learn that the paper heat exchanger can last up to 5 years or even longer even when in constant use. Obviously a breakthrough in that it is less complex, and doesn't use any chemicals for cooling, as well as less energy to operate compared to the traditional air conditioner.
I was also totally surprised by a total lack of hippies (or even hippy like college students). But I guess that was a good sort of surprise.

Sounds entertaining and informative. Any links?













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http://www.nrel.gov/wrec/

There's not a lot about it online, but it was fairly interesting.

2Stroke in some airplanes the AC unit is a heat exchanger capable of producing -35F without the use of a gas. Matter of fact the air has to be warmed before it enters the cabin.

Now you should see some of the new processes and inventions going into cars nowadays. Electric steering,electric brakes are coming. An engine that when you are at a stop light the engine shuts off and restarts when you touch the gas. General Motors came out with anengine that starts off as an 8 cylinder and can drop to a 6 or a four cylinder depending on the need.

General Motors came out with anengine that starts off as an 8 cylinder and can drop to a 6 or a four cylinder depending on the need.
I thought everyone knew about and hated the '81 Cadillac V8-6-4.
I owned 2 with mixed results.
Chrysler uses the same concept in the 300 Hemi with much better results.

As for alcohol as a fuel. Recent studies of the alcohol used in gasohol in the States show it to be a new consumer of energy - that it takes more energy to plant, grow, harvest and process the biomatter source for alcohol than the total amount of alcohol fuel made.
As it stands, alcohol as a fuel is a disaster.
Personally, I believe the answer lies in many multiple sources of energy - wind, solar, tidal, ocean wave energy, and ultimatly, nuclear fusion.

I thought everyone knew about and hated the '81 Cadillac V8-6-4.
I owned 2 with mixed results.
Chrysler uses the same concept in the 300 Hemi with much better results.


This is a brand new engine coming out this year, it is unlike the old caddy 8-6-4.

As for alcohol as a fuel. Recent studies of the alcohol used in gasohol in the States show it to be a new consumer of energy - that it takes more energy to plant, grow, harvest and process the biomatter source for alcohol than the total amount of alcohol fuel made. As it stands, alcohol as a fuel is a disaster.
And yet as it stands, it's easier to produce than gasoline, burns cleaner than gasoline, is easier to set up production for than gasoline, and is renewable, unlike gasoline... It's also easier and cheaper to convert a car to run on alcohol than it is for it to be converted to run on other fuel sources like propane or hydrogen etc.
If Alcohol is a disaster - then what do you consider our current fossil fuels to be? :)
Let us also consider that when produced on a large enough scale, alcohol can be considerably cheaper to produce and buy than gasoline. In Brazil, alcohol costs just a bit over half of what gas costs - South American countries (those which haven't had their economies destroyed by Oil Companies) have been using alcohol for decades. They have had their up and dows with alcohol fuels, but then again so has everybody else with their fossil fuels, niether is perfect, but as I've pointed out, alcohol has many advantages over gasoline - and few disaadvantages, such as hard starting in cold weather, and vapor lock in warm weather (if you're using Ethyl). The point I'm mkaing is that out of all the alternative fuels for use in IC engines (excepting diesels) Alcohol makes the most sense, and is the most practical.