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FYI
----- Original Message -----
From: S. Fred. Singer
To: TWTW@sepp.org
Sent: Wednesday, December 12, 2001 11:21 PM
Subject: TWTW Dec 8, 2001 At the end of WW-II, I attended lectures on Modern Physics, given by Teller at George Washington University. But I only met him in 1950 at Los Alamos when he offered me a job on what I later learned were H-bomb tests. Many years after that, General Jim Abrahamson offered me the position of Chief Scientist of SDI; but I didn't take that one either. I only met Oppenheimer once - when he had moved to Princeton and was one of the examiners at my Ph.D. oral exam. http://www.sepp.org/NewSEPP/Teller.htm The Week That Was December 8, 2001 brought to you by SEPP For oral presentation at AGU meeting in San Francisco, Dec. 12, 2001 A Carbon-Free Energy Future By Henry R. Linden. Max McGraw Professor of Energy and Power Engineering and Management Director, Energy + Power Center Chemical and Environmental Engineering Department Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, Illinois and S. Fred Singer Professor Emeritus of Environmental Sciences University of Virginia It is generally agreed that hydrogen is an ideal energy source, both for transportation and for the generation of electric power. Through the use of fuel cells, hydrogen becomes a high-efficiency carbon-free power source for electromotive transport; with the help of regenerative braking, cars should be able to reach triple the current mileage. Many have visualized a distributed electric supply network with decentralized generation based on fuel cells. Fuel cells can provide high generation efficiencies by overcoming the fundamental thermodynamic limitation imposed by the Carnot cycle. Further, by using the heat energy of the high-temperature fuel cell in co-generation, one can achieve total thermal efficiencies approaching 100 percent, as compared to present-day average power-plant efficiencies of around 35 percent. In addition to reducing CO2 emissions, distributed generation based on fuel cells also eliminates the tremendous release of waste heat into the environment, the need for cooling water, and related limitations on siting. Manufacture of hydrogen remains a key problem, but there are many technical solutions that come into play whenever the cost equations permit. One can visualize both central and local hydrogen production. Initially, reforming of abundant natural gas into mixtures of 80% H2 and 20% CO2 provides a relatively low-emission source of hydrogen. Conventional fossil-fuel plants and nuclear plants can become hydrogen factories using both high-temperature topping cycles and electrolysis of water. Hydroelectric plants can manufacture hydrogen by electrolysis. Later, photovoltaic and wind farms could be set up at favorable locations around the world as hydrogen factories. If perfected, photovoltaic hydrogen production through catalysis would use solar photons most efficiently. For both wind and PV, hydrogen production solves some crucial problems: intermittency of wind and of solar radiation, storage of energy, and use of locations that are not desirable for other economic uses. A hydrogen-based energy future is inevitable as low-cost sources of petroleum and natural gas become depleted with time. However, such fundamental changes in energy systems will take time to accomplish. Coal may survive for a longer time but may not be able to compete as the century draws to a close. *************************************** EFFECTS OF AN OIL SUPPLY REDUCTION [Readers: What's wrong with this summary? The answer is given below] What would happen in the unlikely event Saudi Arabian oil was cut off? In the long run, not much, say economists. However, in the short run it would be economically uncomfortable to the United States and other oil-importing countries. o Saudis' output of 7.5 million barrels a day represents 10 percent of the world supply. o In the short term, energy economists say that if that supply was cut off, the world oil price might rise to $55 a barrel. o The short-term price increases would reduce Gross Domestic Product in oil consuming countries by 3 percent to 4 percent in the first year. But due to national reserves and unused production capacity, the supply could be increased quickly in the short term, and in the longer term higher prices would encourage increased production. o In the short term, U.S. oil production could increase 300,000 barrels a day, and in the longer term by up to one million. o Other Middle East countries have the spare capacity to increase production by 2.5 million barrels a day. o Another million barrels might come from Mexico, Venezuela, and the North Sea. o And the strategic oil stocks of Japan, the U.S. and Germany hold 1.2 billion barrels, which if released at a rate of five million barrels daily would last six to eight months. Thus the entire Saudi supply could be replaced from other sources. In any event, say economists, the economic shock of higher petroleum prices would be lessened in the U.S. because oil use relative to GDP has dropped almost 45 percent since 1979 and the real, or inflation-adjusted, price of oil has fallen by one third. This means money spent on oil is about 40 percent of what it was relative to GDP 20 years ago. Source: Susan Lee, "We Can Live Without Saudi Oil, Wall Street Journal," The Dismal Science, November 13, 2001. [Answer: Since oil is fungible, the price would rise to ALL consumers -even in countries that export oil - under free-market conditions. Incidentally, the price of gasoline would rise by about 70 cents per gallon - no big deal. In Europe, where gasoline sells for around $4, the increase would hardly be noticed. In the U.S., electric power comes mostly from coal, nuclear, hydro, and methane - and would be little affected.] ************************ PROTECTION AGAINST NUCLEAR REACTOR TERRORISM WASHINGTON, Nov. 28 - Spurred by the attacks in September, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is moving toward buying millions of doses of a drug that protects against thyroid cancer that might result from radiation exposure. The idea of stockpiling the drug, potassium iodide, has been debated since the 1979 accident at Three Mile Island, near Harrisburg, Pa. Proponents renewed discussions of the proposal after the 1986 accident of the Chernobyl reactor in the Ukraine, now blamed for thousands of thyroid cancers, mostly in people who were in utero or younger than 2 years old at the time. Those people, regardless of their age, who took potassium iodide at the time, were protected. In 1998, the commission decided to offer the drug free to any state that wanted to stockpile it, but the following year it reversed itself and rescinded the offer. Now the commission has set aside $800,000, enough to buy millions of doses to offer to states, and is waiting for a guidance document from the Food and Drug Administration on how big a radiation dose warrants use of the drug, and how much of the drug should be given to babies, children, adults and pregnant women. For those younger than 18 and for pregnant or lactating women, the F.D.A. will recommend giving the drug at a level of radiation exposure a fifth as large as advised in the 1980's. When reactors split uranium atoms, one of the fragments is an intensely radioactive form of iodine, which can be absorbed by people directly or can land in pastures, where it is eaten by cows and concentrated in their milk. One reason children are vulnerable is that they drink more milk than adults do. Potassium iodide works by saturating the human thyroid gland with normal iodine so it cannot absorb radioactive iodine. Potassium iodide can cross the placenta, but the prime protective mechanism in pregnant women is that its use reduces the ability of the mother to absorb the radioactive variety. But the drug must be given before the radiation exposure, or very soon after, which means it must be stored near the site of potential exposure. ***************** And finally: TREE-HUGGER NEWS From Wash Times, Dec.3 Julia Butterfly Hill (that's really her name) made headlines in 1997 when she took up residence in a California redwood tree she named Luna. She refused to leave unless her demands were met. Two years later, property owner Pacific Lumber finally agreed not to cut down Luna and trees around it. Her environmentalist supporters created a special website www.lunatree.org whose ownership recently lapsed. Now pornographers have taken over the site and refuse to leave unless their demands (for much money) are met. Hmmm.. ************************ |