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Oh so CLEVER
So we started talking about sustainability in intro to engineering today, and of course we watched Fight Club last friday night, so the idea was still in my mind, and I thought the following:
"Okay there's we'll say 300k americans who are on average 20lbs overweight. That's 6bil lbs * 14,630kJoules/lb
Let's convert a similar volume to gasoline, for reference.
The specific gravity of fat is about 0.9g*cm^-3 (it floats on water), 0.45359237 kilograms to the pound.
8.778E13 kilojoules for the american race from fat. That's 2.722E9 kilograms; converted to volume it's 3.024E9 cubic centimeters, or 3.024E6 decimeters. That is directly equivilent to 3.024E6 liters.
8.778E13 kilojoules per 3.024E6 liters = 2.903E7 kJ/L or 2.9E4 MJ/L
Wikipedia gives gasolene as 34.8 MJ/L.
If everyone in america gave 20lbs of fat via liposuction or similar techniques, I could drive my car for about 7700 miles. Basically, the entire length of the Silk Road.
so what kinds of alternative energy could you come up with?
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Garbage used as fuel maybe.
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small children.
jk just more nuclear @_@
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of course, the money and power the liposuction would cost is not up for debate here..
same as with the first generation of solar panels, everyone talks about money and the enviroment, while the energy making the silicon wafers was more then the solar panel would generate in its entire lifecycle
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If they can find a way to plug my arrogance and hubris into the national grid we wouldn't have an energy crisis.
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They ought to develop a convertor for logical fallacies. They could ship a number of them to the Fox news network and we'd be set, I believe.
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engineering hurts my brain. +cringe+
perhaps, instead of liposuction, we could harness the power of gyms. The people on those mounted bicycles are basically turning a TURBINE TO NOWHERE!! hook em' up to a grid and make a "fit people battery".
its an idea
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I know how to build a perpetual motion engine. I'm just waiting for the idea to be scientifically palatable before I actually do anything with the data.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Aerith's Knight
of course, the money and power the liposuction would cost is not up for debate here..
Government subsidies 8)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Rubah Lapah
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Aerith's Knight
of course, the money and power the liposuction would cost is not up for debate here..
Government subsidies 8)
However, if the total power expended would be more than the 7700 miles' worth of power, it doesn't matter whether subsidized or not, it'd be a net loss and thus pointless.
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Yeah but everyone would be a lot healthier :D not having to pump enough blood and air to move around unnecessary pounds of nastiness.
Plus it'd be a renewable resource 8)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Captain Maxx Power
If they can find a way to plug my arrogance and hubris into the national grid we wouldn't have an energy crisis.
You and the rest of humanity. Present speaker included.
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If a battery system could be made efficient enough and a reasonable way to dispose of used uranium rods could be found, I think the option of nuclear-generated electricity plus battery powered cars would be pretty legit.
I think the biggest hurdle is the disposal of waste though... throwing the rods into a mine and waiting for them to decay isn't a very welcoming thought.
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Just throw all of the waste into a black hole, or the sun.
Seriously use biodiesel. It is renewable, and the waste from making it can be used to make biodegradable plastics.
Also, a controlled fusion reactor would be great, even though we have one already. (The sun)
Wind energy is also very clean.
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Wind, hydroelectric, geothermal. They have to be implemented carefully - especially hyro - but if they're done well, then they're virtually inexhaustible sources.
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All we need IS THE POWER OF LOVE!!!!!
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
blackmage_nuke
All we need IS THE POWER OF LOVE!!!!!
...plutonium?
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
qwertyxsora
Seriously use biodiesel. It is renewable, and the waste from making it can be used to make biodegradable plastics.
The benefits of biodiesel make me say "Why aren't we using more of it?" on a regular basis.
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I say we harvest and liquefy the homeless to use in our cars.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
o_O
Quote:
Originally Posted by
qwertyxsora
Seriously use biodiesel. It is renewable, and the waste from making it can be used to make biodegradable plastics.
The
benefits of biodiesel make me say "Why aren't we using more of it?" on a regular basis.
Primarily because the vast amount of farm land needed to replace fossil fuels (by which I mean a great deal more than is currently in use) would probably cause just as much ecological damage as fossil fuels are right now.
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Yeah, biodiesel and similar are just transitional solutions. Wind power is the way of the future. The way of the future. The way of the future. Damn! The way of the future.
In gyms, we could replace the primitive systems where we actually spend electrical energy to be able to spend our physical energy all the better with systems where the bike you work out so furiously on stores the energy and puts it to use instead.
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Produce more dinosaurs for more fossils I think. Someone told me gasoline is from fossil fuels!
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Dolentrean
I say we harvest and liquefy the homeless to use in our cars.
Don't forget the elderly :cool:
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Rantzien
Yeah, biodiesel and similar are just transitional solutions. Wind power is the way of the future. The way of the future. The way of the future. Damn! The way of the future.
We talked about wind power in class, and this slim blonde girl piped up in her quiet voice about how wind farms cause damage downwind where there's less wind and the climage changes.
If 'global warming' = true, then there's more radiant energy in our atmosphere. More energy = more storms (and more importantly) more wind. The wind has picked up considerably the last few years. There have been dozens of seemingly solid trees in my hometown that were just uprooted. Healthy oak trees just blown over. There's been two trees in my backyard that blew over, a pine and a mulberry (the mulberry survived because it was next to a concrete patio and could only blow halfway over. It looks so silly making branches out of its roots xD).
Also a thought I had is that we can't depend on finding some miracle replacement for what we use now. We'll have to finetune our power generation to our power usages, and that's the only way we can regain anything back against the likes of friction, heat, and sound.
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If I ever set up a business it would be one that puts solar panels and small arrays of wind turbines on top of people's roofs. Everytime I go past the multitudes of houses on my way to Uni I'm reminded of the idea.
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Tap the methane from landfills.
Solar panels powering things during the day. Use the excess energy to pump water up a hill. Then use HEP to create more energy by letting that water run back down the hill through the turbines for when the solar panels aren't effective.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Rubah Lapah
We talked about wind power in class, and this slim blonde girl piped up in her quiet voice about how wind farms cause damage downwind where there's less wind and the climage changes.
That's... incredibly dopey of her. A wind farm will cause a miniscule reduction in the amount of wind that reaches places downwind, but you get a bigger effect by erecting a building or a fence. Personally, I think the US is just desperate to avoid adopting any solution that'll actually help the environment by reducing fossil fuel usage - a bit of silly propaganda like "wind power destroys the climate" and everyone turns against it immediately.
In my own country, rich landowners are doing a lot of pissing and moaning about wind power, but only because they can't stand the thought of being able to hear and see windmills. "Visual pollution", they call it, even though the benefits outweigh the harm by an immense margin.
Wind power is the ultimate renewable resource. It recharges itself. The turbine is a simple mechanism. There are no toxic byproducts, except the lubricants used to keep the thing running smoothly. Overall, the only reasons for opposing wind power are (1) a selfish "not in my backyard!" attitude, and (2) a compulsive desire to keep using existing sources. It takes a lot of turbines to create large amounts of electricity, which increases setup costs and maintenance, but it's still a better choice for the long-term.
Hydroelectric is 'clean', but there can be significant ecological impacts: dams prevent silt being washed downstream, causing greater erosion and loss of minerals. However, a carefully planned and managed hydroelectric scheme reduces the impact, and generates vast amounts of power, since it's using two of nature's great unstoppable forces: water pressure, and gravity.
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Hydroelectric was brought up and then put back down with the 'most of the dams that can be built in the US to any great effect have been built'.
there's one in my hometown (we also have a nuclear power plant). When they built the dam, they created Lake Dardanelle and displaced quite a few people; there's roads leading into water that I never knew about until my dad pointed them out.
(of course the lake gets a lot of recreational use, and I'm sure they reimbursed the people that had to move, but it's kinda creepy to think of a lost city underwater)
I like windmills. some day I'm going to get my dad to invest in some to put up at the house. he's always wanted to, but balked at the up-front cost.
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I still think my method is ultra-win.
Just a tad expensive.
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They're all expensive, that's [one of the reasons] why no one's used them yet.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Harle-Quin
Use the excess energy to pump water up a hill. Then use HEP to create more energy by letting that water run back down the hill
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Harle-Quin
I still think my method is ultra-win.
Pumping water uphill then re-using it on the way down won't generate extra energy... :p basic physics comes into play: you can't get something from nothing; pumping water uphill for re-use it too much like perpetual motion. I suppose it'd work if you could use a phenomenally efficient means for pumping that water up, though...
There's another form of energy that is truly worldwide and never runs out or diminishes: that energy is the difference in air pressure at sea level, that occurs between high tide and low tide. Problem is, it's a fairly subtle change and hard to harness. But if there *was* an easy way to do it, you'd have the cleanest possible energy source, one that'll never diminish. I think there have been experiments with using this source of power, but without substantially beneficial results.
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Solar, wind and hydro power probably. It's best to use the materials that aren't man made. :)
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whatever you all might say and think about green energy. Go study physics for 8 years then come back.
Every physicist agrees that the best bet next to oil is nuclear.. whether fission or fusion, depends on when its put into place., as fusion isnt perfected yet.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Aerith's Knight
whatever you all might say and think about green energy. Go study physics for 8 years then come back.
Every physicist agrees that the best bet next to oil is nuclear.. whether fission or fusion, depends on when its put into place., as fusion isnt perfected yet.
Fusion will be great once it's made practicable. Fission is indeed efficient, and for the overwhelming majority of the time it's safe and clean... but there's still the issue of storing large amounts of unspeakably volatile waste products. And besides - when something does go wrong with a nuclear reactor, the results can be devastating beyond compare. Yes, Chernobyl was a freak accident resulting from a series of incompetent and mismanaged failures, but it still took place. Over twenty years later, people are still dying and a vast area is still uninhabitable. That's from a single accident. By eschewing nuclear power, we're reducing the risk of further such incidents, and avoiding the buildup of radioactive waste products.
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Plus wind turbines are pretty.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Big D
Over twenty years later, people are still dying and a vast area is still uninhabitable.
Aren't the flora and fauna thriving there since there aren't any people to get in the way? Or was just more lies from the solitary motorcyclist fraud? xD
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The ecology's doing ok in the radiation zone, I think. Plant life especially, since trees cope pretty well with mutation.
Quote:
solitary motorcyclist fraud?
That was a hoax? I had no idea...
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Solar and Wind Power seem like the most effective choices, and the simplest. Either of those would work just fine.
I'd much rather just modify work-out equipment to power my home, though. :monster:
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Big D
The ecology's doing ok in the radiation zone, I think. Plant life especially, since trees cope pretty well with mutation.
Quote:
solitary motorcyclist fraud?
That was a hoax? I had no idea...
The jury is out, but some people think she was.
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wind power is nothing.
Even for a country as small as the netherlands. We have lots of turbines.. all along the coast.. thousends and thousends.. and still they generate nearly nothing. One turbine is what? 12.5 kWh?
solar power has potential, but it would have to be pretty sunny for it to be comercially useful.
If there was such a thing as a clean a good solution, it wouldve been put in practise already. Although.. i think the oil companies would buy those up..
Quote:
Originally Posted by
qwertyxsora
Also, a controlled fusion reactor would be great, even though we have one already. (The sun)
We have those on small scale, and building them on large scale.
I think what you mean is cold fusion.
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Perpetual Motion Engine (Mar, 1933)
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A real perpetual mobile does not excist. The reason for this is usually the disappation of energy through heat due to friction.
btw a perpetual mobile creates more work(energy) then you put into it. (or just keeps going forever)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Aerith's Knight
wind power is nothing.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
qwertyxsora
Also, a controlled fusion reactor would be great, even though we have one already. (The sun)
We have those on small scale, and building them on large scale.
I think what you mean is cold fusion.
I know of a bunch of fission reactors, but I've never heard of an actual fusion reactor being built. They run kinda hot.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Rubah Lapah
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Aerith's Knight
wind power is nothing.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
qwertyxsora
Also, a controlled fusion reactor would be great, even though we have one already. (The sun)
We have those on small scale, and building them on large scale.
I think what you mean is cold fusion.
I know of a bunch of fission reactors, but I've never heard of an actual fusion reactor being built. They run kinda hot.
If i remember correctly ranging from 17000-23000 K
i went on a college field trip to a research facility
they use magnetic confinement
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Aerith's Knight
A real perpetual mobile does not excist. The reason for this is usually the disappation of energy through heat due to friction.
btw a perpetual mobile creates more work(energy) then you put into it. (or just keeps going forever)
Give it up for Captain Obvious!
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Balzac
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Aerith's Knight
A real perpetual mobile does not excist. The reason for this is usually the disappation of energy through heat due to friction.
btw a perpetual mobile creates more work(energy) then you put into it. (or just keeps going forever)
Give it up for Captain Obvious!
some of the slower kids.. like you.. might need some help.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Aerith's Knight
btw a perpetual mobile creates more work(energy) then you put into it. (or just keeps going forever)
A perpetual motion machine should conserve all energy in the system perfectly. If it created more than was put in that would both violate the law of conservation of energy and result in a system with increasing energy. The principle of a system that conserves all energy doesn't violate the law of conservation of energy.
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http://www.coolest-gadgets.com/wp-co.../mr_fusion.jpg
Again proving that all of life's problems will be solved in the future.
