Topic: Energy (Page 2)
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π SkySails
SkySails GmbH & Co. KG is a Hamburg-based company that sells kite rigs to propel cargo ships, large yachts and fishing vessels by wind energy. Ships are pulled by an automatically-controlled foil kite of some hundreds of square meters. For multiple reasons, they give many times the thrust per unit area of conventional mast-mounted sails.
The systems save fuel, and reduce carbon emissions and shipping costs, but have not been widely adopted.
Discussed on
- "SkySails" | 2019-07-04 | 126 Upvotes 42 Comments
π Traveling Wave Reactor
A traveling-wave reactor (TWR) is a proposed type of nuclear fission reactor that can convert fertile material into usable fuel through nuclear transmutation, in tandem with the burnup of fissile material. TWRs differ from other kinds of fast-neutron and breeder reactors in their ability to use fuel efficiently without uranium enrichment or reprocessing, instead directly using depleted uranium, natural uranium, thorium, spent fuel removed from light water reactors, or some combination of these materials. The concept is still in the development stage and no TWRs have ever been built.
The name refers to the fact that fission remains confined to a boundary zone in the reactor core that slowly advances over time. TWRs could theoretically run self-sustained for decades without refueling or removing spent fuel.
Discussed on
- "Traveling Wave Reactor" | 2019-10-05 | 76 Upvotes 66 Comments
π Oliver Heaviside
Oliver Heaviside FRS (; 18 May 1850 β 3 February 1925) was an English self-taught electrical engineer, mathematician, and physicist who adapted complex numbers to the study of electrical circuits, invented mathematical techniques for the solution of differential equations (equivalent to Laplace transforms), reformulated Maxwell's field equations in terms of electric and magnetic forces and energy flux, and independently co-formulated vector analysis. Although at odds with the scientific establishment for most of his life, Heaviside changed the face of telecommunications, mathematics, and science.
Discussed on
- "Oliver Heaviside" | 2014-12-26 | 100 Upvotes 25 Comments
π Long time nuclear waste warning messages
Long-time nuclear waste warning messages are intended to deter human intrusion at nuclear waste repositories in the far future, within or above the order of magnitude of 10,000 years. Nuclear semiotics is an interdisciplinary field of research, first done by the Human Interference Task Force since 1981.
A 1996 report from Sandia National Laboratories recommended that any such message should comprise four levels of increasing complexity:
- Level I: Rudimentary Information: "Something man-made is here"
- Level II: Cautionary Information: "Something man-made is here and it is dangerous"
- Level III: Basic Information: Tells what, why, when, where, who, and how
- Level IV: Complex Information: Highly detailed written records, tables, figures, graphs, maps and diagrams
Discussed on
- "Long-time nuclear waste warning messages" | 2021-01-03 | 23 Upvotes 3 Comments
- "Long time nuclear waste warning messages" | 2019-08-05 | 65 Upvotes 42 Comments
π In 1979, a Gulf of Mexico oil spill went on for 10 months at about the BP rate.
Ixtoc I was an exploratory oil well being drilled by the semi-submersible drilling rig Sedco 135 in the Bay of Campeche of the Gulf of Mexico, about 100Β km (62Β mi) northwest of Ciudad del Carmen, Campeche in waters 50Β m (160Β ft) deep. On 3 June 1979, the well suffered a blowout resulting in one of the largest oil spills in history.
Discussed on
- "In 1979, a Gulf of Mexico oil spill went on for 10 months at about the BP rate." | 2010-05-28 | 88 Upvotes 41 Comments
π Salters Duck
Salter's duck, also known as the nodding duck or by its official name the Edinburgh duck, is a device that converts wave power into electricity. The wave impact induces rotation of gyroscopes located inside a pear-shaped "duck", and an electrical generator converts this rotation into electricity with an overall efficiency of up to 90%. The Salter's duck was invented by Stephen Salter in response to the oil shortage in the 1970s and was one of the earliest generator designs proposed to the Wave Energy programme in the United Kingdom. The funding for the project was cut off in the early 1980s after oil prices rebounded and the UK government moved away from alternative energy sources. As of May 2018 no wave-power devices have ever gone into large-scale production.
Discussed on
- "Salters Duck" | 2015-01-30 | 84 Upvotes 39 Comments
π James Lovelock Has Died
James Ephraim Lovelock (26 July 1919 β 26 July 2022) was a British independent scientist, environmentalist and futurist. He was best known for proposing the Gaia hypothesis, which postulates that the Earth functions as a self-regulating system.
With a PhD in medicine, Lovelock began his career performing cryopreservation experiments on rodents, including successfully thawing frozen specimens. His methods were influential in the theories of cryonics (the cryopreservation of humans). He invented the electron capture detector, and using it, became the first to detect the widespread presence of chlorofluorocarbons in the atmosphere. While designing scientific instruments for NASA, he developed the Gaia hypothesis.
In the 2000s, he proposed a method of climate engineering to restore carbon dioxideβconsuming algae. He was an outspoken member of Environmentalists for Nuclear, asserting that fossil fuel interests have been behind opposition to nuclear energy, citing the effects of carbon dioxide as being harmful to the environment, and warning of global warming due to the greenhouse effect. He authored several environmental science books based upon the Gaia hypothesis from the late 1970s.
Discussed on
- "James Lovelock Has Died" | 2022-07-27 | 100 Upvotes 19 Comments
π The fire that has been burning for 56 years
The Centralia mine fire is a coal-seam fire that has been burning underneath the borough of Centralia, Pennsylvania, United States, since at least May 27, 1962. Its original cause is still a matter of debate. It is burning in underground coal mines at depths of up to 300 feet (90Β m) over an 8-mile (13Β km) stretch of 3,700 acres (15Β km2). At its current rate, it could continue to burn for over 250 years. It has caused most of the town to be abandoned: the population dwindled from around 1,500 at the time the fire started to 7 in 2013, and most of the buildings have been levelled.
Discussed on
- "Pennsylvania town coal mine has been on fire since 1962" | 2021-02-07 | 60 Upvotes 35 Comments
- "The fire that has been burning for 56 years" | 2018-12-13 | 12 Upvotes 5 Comments
π European Super Grid
The European super grid is a possible future super grid that would ultimately interconnect the various European countries and the regions around Europe's borders β including North Africa, Kazakhstan, and Turkey β with a high-voltage direct current (HVDC) power grid.
It is envisaged that a European super grid would:
- lower the cost of power in all participating countries by allowing the entire region to share the most efficient power plants;
- pool load variability and power station unreliability, reducing the margin of inefficient spinning reserve and standby that have to be supplied;
- allow for wider use of renewable energy, particularly wind energy, from the concept that "it is always windy somewhere" β in particular it tends to be windy in the summer in North Africa, and windy in the winter in Europe;
- allow wide sharing of the total European hydro power resource, which is about 6 weeks of full load European output;
- decrease Europe's dependence on imported fuels.
Discussed on
- "European Super Grid" | 2021-03-08 | 77 Upvotes 33 Comments
π Desertec
DESERTEC was a large-scale project supported by a foundation of the same name and the consortium Dii (Desertec industrial initiative) created in Germany as a limited liability company (GmbH). The project aimed at creating a global renewable energy plan based on the concept of harnessing sustainable power from sites where renewable sources of energy are more abundant and transferring it through high-voltage direct current transmission to consumption centers. All kinds of renewable energy sources are envisioned, but the sun-rich deserts of the world play a special role.
There are some parallels between Desertec and the Atlantropa project plan in the 1920s. Atlantropa aimed to integrate Europe and Northern Africa and its electricity grid based on a giant hydro power station at Gibraltar. The industry platform Dii is continuing to pave the way for renewables and grid integration on a very pragmatic basis. As of 2019 the project is described as largely "stalled" and "failed".
Discussed on
- "Desertec" | 2015-03-23 | 70 Upvotes 27 Comments