Posted on 02/24/2012 10:29:04 AM PST by stolinsky
News report: President Obama declares that rather than drilling for new sources of oil, or building the pipeline, we should get fuel from algae.
Algie saw the bear
The bear saw Algie
The bear was bulgy
The bulge was Algie
-- Red Skelton
But use this unproven technology to replace the entire process wholesale? Not really likely. What an idiot.
Why not do both?
Obama is steeped in slime. He knows all about it.
Obama is the Big Green Algae Machine...
How’d that chicken droppings thing ever work out?
Oil works and we have more of it than 0bama and company want to admit, so until algae is economically viable, don’t make the switch.
You will not be allowed to use filters or pumps to agitate, you will only be allowed to enjoy the slimy "GREEN" stuff. They will probably also charge you for the slime removal from your water area.
suggest to Obama: soylent green?
The technology is not unproven. It can and does produce diesel fuel. What is still in question is the enough money to be made to justify the capital cost.
A simple change in how the government reauthorizes CRP (crop reduction program) payments can create a whole new agriculture / oil market. Land that is currently considered non-farmable and not currently qualifying for CRP payments, may be converted to grow algae and no other crops and still qualify for CRP. A minimum of 1,000 gallons of diesel fuel must be sold to the market to qualify.
Run this program for 10 years with an automatic “kill” of the program at the end of that time.
And would they be gathering this algae from the waters in front of the Kennedy Compound where the windmills are supposed to be?
Algae is a plant and plants need mass amounts of fertilizer.
The technology to use algae to produce fuel has been around for a while but it is not in any way going to make a significant impact, certainly not immediately and not a 17% replacement difference.
Any democrat who opens their mouth is spewing a lie from start to finish and spewing greenhouse gasses (by their definition).
Let’s sew up the orifices of every registered democrat for a cleaner environment.
They have spent over 2 years planning and building an algae farm around here and it still isn’t finished. The technology isn’t all that good and I havn’t seen anything about cost effectiveness.
Two words for the Obama-bot green-tards:
ENERGY DENSITY
It’s taken millions of years and countless quadrillions upon quadrillions of ancient algae cells to form the thick, dense, highly concentrated substance we know as crude oil. Just how expensive and on what massive a scale could this natural process be feasibily replicated in a factory that would come close to satisfying the motoring, flying, plastic-using public???
Barry? Barry? Barry?
True, that wasn't the best choice of words.
Question is, will it scale up. The US uses, what, 20-odd million bls of crude a day? That's a whole lot of algae.
I think that it's worth investigating. But, for BO to say "Sure, we'll just do .....this" is dumb. But not unexpected. :-)
The thing about “energy” is that when it comes down to it, the best thing alternative energy sources can do is to store their energy in some form of hydrocarbons. Battery technology is just not going to cut it. A Chevy Volt has a battery that has the equivalent of 1 gallon of gasoline and costs $10,000. They Telsa’s battery pack costs $40,000 and that is the premier tech right now for EV cars (160-230 miles per charge). But of course the batteries die, making these vehicles much more expensive than they initially appear.
However we can use all sorts of different technology to make synthetic fuels. If you MUST go carbon neutral, You only need water, carbon dioxide (from the air) and electricity. Thus, going to electric vehicles is backwards. Google the iron oxide cycle for an interesting take on how that might happen coupled with a nuclear reactor. There are also other ways to make carbon neutral synthetic fuel. Algae too might be economical, but not today.
Of course you can convert coal to synthetic fuel and we have plenty of high sulfur coal that is just laying around in the ground, if you don’t care about carbon.
Considering the fact that there are solutions on the horizon (say under 50 years) that will allow us to have cheap energy indefinitely, why not make the smart decision to utilize all the energy reserves we have right now? Keep the money we are exporting in our own country and reap the economic benefits. Duh right?
Honestly, I don't know all that much about it. Made sense to me to give it a try.
In a rational world, you and I would say "Hmmmmm, this might fly. Let's try it." and if it doesn't produce energy at a better-than-breakeven cost, we'd scrap the idea and move to the next thing.
Unfortunately, we're talking about government. So Common Sense will go out the window.
Heck, they're still throwing money by the snowshovel-full at Solar and Wind power, which are two technologies that anyone with an Engineering Degree (or just a FReeper with a decent amount of sense) can tell you won't ever scale up.
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