[Aeronaut]

Thanx for helping me narrow the gap, Jimmy.

I just reread page 1, so now I see why Rematog insists it won’t run his turbines. The only way I can see that temperature range carrying off 17M BTU/hr is one heckuva high velocity gas flow.

So let’s turn this thing around, since utes are likely early adopters in relatively small numbers. In small numbers, these “producing prototypes” could dump the excess heat without a public backlash, since they will be perceived as big boys’ toys.

What would happen if we used the 5MW to electrically heat the boilers, perhaps using induction heating? I’d like to see at least 50MW usable output rating, but even 10MW is 2:1 leverage, while eliminating all of the fuel hassles.

Now your ROI is how long it takes you to burn ~2M$ of coal. The deal can be sweetened by eliminating all of the labor, space, machinery, and emissions, both direct and indirect, of burning coal. Rising oil and gas prices will have similarly rapid breakevens.

[Aeronaut]

No, they certainly won’t buy until it makes rock-solid business sense. Something that just dawned on me- are you saying that the cryogenic helium chiller is going to absorb over 70% of the excess heat, and that that’s why the temperature’s too low to run your turbines?

[Aeronaut]

Thanx for the info, Rematog. B&W;built the 1200# / 30,000 SHP plant (circa ~1960) that I’ve been using as a steam to torque model. Actually, the ship was commissioned in ’63 with a 600# plant and was being upgraded to 1200 when I got there in ’76.

So FF just might work in a steam turbine, depending on the heat exchanger’s input temperature and transfer efficiency. I was going through some notes earlier today and was reminded of the distinction between combustion turbines and steam turbines. I also read a thread yesterday on a flameless turbo/ramjet engine. Do you think that might be applicable to the utilities industry?

[Aeronaut]

That’s a goldmine, Admin. Now it’s down to temperatures, pressures, and flow rates expected for both loops of the heat exchanger. (I’m from Missouri). I just printed the steam tables and thermodynamics, but I can see a lack of information coming up fast.

Rematog, how are your plants fueled, and what temperature is the flame? Thanx.

[Aeronaut]

I stand both enlightened and confused, Rematog. I had no idea we were talking that much pressure or that many stages. Something else that’s adding to my confusion is the apparent very high temperatures (degrees C, K, electron volts, etc.) at or barely off the electrodes that must be removed.

One of the reasons I keep hammering away at this is that engineering this “waste” heat into existing infrastructure could make our 5MW plant marketable as a 7 to 9 MW, greener than grass plant thats in step with the times.

Another, even more important reason is that for every high profile idea there is some jerk(s) who will grab headlines by attacking it. That is why I believe we better build an efficient system. Imagine trying to sell the world the concept of millions of these little power plants, each throwing off more heat per hour than I can really wrap my head around.

In the marketing world, perceptions are more important than facts, and that many new BTUs is screaming to be labeled as the Polar Blowtorch that’s going to submerge half the world.

The only parts that I don’t believe we’ve really touched on are the temperature of the formerly cryogenic helium transferring 17M BTU/hr into our feed water, along with the size and energy requirements of helium cooling loop.

I’d like to see FF locomotives as well as ships. Seems that getting it to work in a utility setting would be the first size/mass/net output hurdle.

[Aeronaut]

You lost me there, Jimmy, I don’t know either of those words. My formal training is as an electronics technician, and I’m self-taught in thermodynamics, mechanical engineering, and machine shop. Lots for me to learn.

17M BTU/hr is too much energy to be tossed out the window, and if thermodynamics works like electricity, we’re allowed to max one variable while reducing another, like transformers do with voltage and current.

[Aeronaut]

You’ve never been to Springfield, Illonois, Rematog. We just spent 4 days down there with friends who lost power for a few hours and say that it happens often. Sigh. Fact of life here. Sigh.

My twin screw guided missile destroyer had a pair of 1200 pound plants using 1 or 2 boilers each to spin triple stage turbines, before the reduction gearing that actually turned the propellers. We could also cross-connect to run off of only 1 boiler when we wanted to pretend we weren’t a fuel guzzler. Granted doubling the pressure more than doubles the latent heat required to make steam, but you’re talking about 17M BTU/hr, and I’d be very surprised if that wasn’t enough.

Let’s pretend this is purely an engineering problem instead of sales/politics tainting the design point. FF is small enough to put right next to your boiler, where the fuel storage and delivery machinery used to be. How many BTUs/hr do those boilers currently need from gas, oil, or coal? Surely not 17M BTU/hr?

[Aeronaut]

Inside every big problem is a little problem trying to get out. Why not sell FF to the utilities as a way to increase production while lowering their operating costs AND protecting their investments?

Rather than use helium to heat water to heat air, why not heat the water into steam to turn their turbines, so the focus turns to upgrading their crumbling grid?

[Aeronaut]

Waste not, want not, Rematog. The bad guys are combustible fuels in almost all of their uses. Targeting the rest of them with “waste” heat keeps the trillions of BTUs from millions of FFs from becoming an environmental and political liability.

[Aeronaut]

Rematog,

Based on 2 yrs of building ~8 to 10 automotive A/C evaporators per minute, I think you’re underestimating the cost savings of mass production. The important part of the equation to me is not just removing excess heat from the FF device, but rather heating water to use in home heating, and further recycling the thermal energy by using the losses from the pipes to heat air as well.

The plant I worked in was probably too isolated for this to be effective, but installing a FF device in a large office and/or apartment building would give us a huge existing heat sink that would further reduce the building’s energy costs.

[Aeronaut]

Jolly Roger wrote:

… Therefore, if 10 N= 1G of acceleration, a 100-ton ship would require only 1kN for 1G. For clarity, that would be tons of mass, not earth weight. 100 metric tons of mass would still be a sizable (and hefty) 1,000 metric tons or 3,200 tons (US) weight.

I don’t understand your math. I will explain mine.

1 Newton (N) of thrust will accelerate 1 kilogram (kg) of mass by 1 meter per second per second (m/sec^2).

10 N will accelerate 1 kg by 10 m/sec^2. 1 Gravity (G) = 9.8 m/sec^2, so 10 N/kg = 1.02 G = ~1 G.

1 metric ton mass is 1,000 kg, therefore it would take ~10,000 N (10 kN) to accelerate it to 1 G.

100 metric tons mass is 100,000 kg, therefore it would take ~1,000,000 N (1 MN) to accelerate it to 1 G.

The Space Shuttle has a mass of ~20,000 metric tons. It needs ~200 MN thrust for 1 G.

Thanx for explaining it more clearly than my texts, Jolly Roger. I was “thinking” I’d seen a typo.

[Aeronaut]

I doubt we have to worry about that when they have ITER, the NIF, and LL hot on the trail.

[Aeronaut]

Brian H wrote:

Brian
Hey! Another space elevator fan. Another worthy project, albiet much less advanced and more complex, but also complimentary to this one.

And yet another one! Remember, the 69,000 mile tether is more than an elevator, it’s also an interplanetary launch system.

Yep. “Slingshot to the Stars!” Or thereabouts. 😉
Alpha Centauri maybe, if we can get .5 C or better average speed. I’m too old for a 20 year round trip.

[Aeronaut]

All I’m going to say about Obama is that he’s a charismatic leader in a time when that is sorely needed. While I didn’t vote for him, he is my President, so there is no point in bickering about that drift.

I researched the US energy consumption sources and conversion efficiencies last week for a special report aimed at selling FF by the numbers. The idea is to repackage that core data for a relentless article marketing campaign aimed at highly emotionally charged issues such as global warming, energy independence, and clean water for developing countries. Here’s the breakdown:

40% of US energy comes from oil, much of it for transportation fuels;
60% from electricity

Charging and discharging batteries is 90% efficient;
Electric motors are 85% efficient;
Burning fuels for heat is 80% efficient;
Internal combustion engines are only 30% efficient.

Coal provides 50% of US electricity;
Nuclear provides 20%;
Natural gas provides 18%;
Other sources provide 12%;

Due to inefficiencies of a crumbling grid, coal-fired electricity sent long distances can end up using only 10% of the BTUs used to produce it as useful electricity when you flip the switch. This means that after we divert farmland and water to growing bio fuels to burn for thermo-electric power we should be locked up in the loony bin.

Sure, wind and solar have free fuel. Once we’ve paid for the installation and accepted their problems with uneven supply and transmission losses through the grid. They are best suited for powering a house with direct current (RV) appliances through a bank of batteries.

Anybody who ignores the bigger picture of how many BTUs are required to produce and deliver a kilowatt hour, let alone how many gallons of water and how many tons of carbon dioxide are produced in the entire process is leaving himself open to merciless ridicule in a skeptical press ruled by entrenched special interests.

[Aeronaut]

I rode San Antonio’s bus for several years back in the ’80s, when it only cost 40 cents. What I saw is a lot of people who needed the transportation but no way were going to be able to afford cars and insurance, etc. These were maids, gardeners, many speaking English as a second language.

The biggest reason public transportation won’t catch on with the masses in most US cities is that it isn’t convenient. How long do you want to wait for a bus in the middle of a Michigan winter? Hell, it’s 5 degrees out there as I write this. Try the bus in a really lousy system like Corpus Christi, Tx had in the early ’80s and it can take several hours to get across town. Each way.

I submit that public transportation needs to be subsidized to keep the economy’s lower paying jobs accessible to the people most likely to fill them. Electric buses and/or streetcars will be the best way to target DPF to eliminating those carbon dioxide emissions.

[Author]

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