P.D. Allen's Blog, page 31
July 20, 2012
Newborn Moment
Quantum Meditation #1581
July 19, 2012
The Myth of the Hydrogen Economy
The Myth of the Hydrogen Economy
by PD Allen
Check out Murderer’s Sky, Book One of Under Shattered Skies in kindle or paperback
download a pdf of this article (black print on a white background)
(pdallen.com) There is a lot of talk about the hydrogen economy. It is at best naïve, and at worst it is dishonest. A hydrogen economy would be a pitiful, impoverished thing indeed.
There are a number of problems with hydrogen fuel cells. Many of these are engineering problems which could probably be worked out in time. But there is one basic flaw which will never be overcome. Free hydrogen is not an energy source; it is rather an energy carrier. Free hydrogen does not exist on this planet, so to derive free hydrogen we must break the hydrogen bond in molecules. Basic chemistry tells us that it requires more energy to break a hydrogen bond than to form one. This is due to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, and there is no getting around it. We are working on catalysts which will help to lower the energy necessary to generate free hydrogen, but there will always be an energy loss, and the catalysts themselves will become terribly expensive if manufactured on a scale to match current transportation energy requirements.
All free hydrogen generated today is derived from natural gas. So right off the bat we have not managed to escape our dependency on nonrenewable hydrocarbons. This feedstock is steam-treated to strip the hydrogen from the methane molecules. And the steam is produced by boiling water with natural gas. Overall, there is about a 60% energy loss in this process. And, as it is dependent on the availability of natural gas, the price of hydrogen generated in this method will always be a multiple of the price of natural gas.
Ah, but there is an inexhaustible supply of water from which we could derive our hydrogen. However, splitting hydrogen from water requires an even higher energy investment per unit of water (286kJ per mole). All processes of splitting water molecules, including foremost electrolysis and thermal decomposition, require major energy investments, rendering them unprofitable.
Hydrogen advocates like to point out that the development of solar cells or wind farms would provide renewable energy that could be used to derive hydrogen. The energy required to produce 1 billion kWh (kilowatt hours) of hydrogen is 1.3 billion kWh of electricity. Even with recent advances in photovoltaic technology, the solar cell arrays would be enormous, and would have to be placed in areas with adequate sunlight.
We must also consider the water from which we derive this hydrogen. To meet our present transportation needs, we would have to divert 5% of the flow of the Mississippi River. This would require yet more energy, further reducing the profits of hydrogen. This water would then have to be delivered to a photovoltaic array the size of the Great Plains. So much for agriculture.
The only way that hydrogen production even approaches practicality is through the use of nuclear plants. To generate the amount of energy used presently by the United States, we would require an additional 900 nuclear reactors, at a cost of roughly $1 billion per reactor. Currently, there are only 440 nuclear reactors operating worldwide. Unless we perfect fast breeder reactors very quickly, we will have a shortage of uranium long before we have finished our reactor building program.
Even hydrogen fuel derived from nuclear power would be expensive. To fill a car up with enough hydrogen to be equivalent to a 15 gallon gas tank could cost as much as $400. If the hydrogen was in gaseous form, this tank would have to be big enough to accommodate 178,500 liters. Compressed hydrogen would reduce the storage tank to one tenth of this size. And liquefied hydrogen would require a fuel tank of only four times the size of a gasoline tank. In other words, a 15 gallon tank of gasoline would be equivalent to a 60 gallon tank of liquefied hydrogen. And, oh yes, to transport an equivalent energy amount of hydrogen to the fueling station would require 21 times more trucks than for gasoline.
Compressed and liquefied hydrogen present problems of their own. Both techniques require energy and so further reduce the net energy ratio of the hydrogen. Liquid hydrogen is cold enough to freeze air, leading to problems with pressure build-ups due to clogged valves. Both forms of hydrogen storage are prone to leaks. In fact, all forms of pure hydrogen are difficult to store.
Hydrogen is the smallest element and, as such, it can leak from any container, no matter how well sealed it is. Hydrogen in storage will evaporate at a rate of at least 1.7% per day. We will not be able to store hydrogen vehicles in buildings. Nor can we allow them to sit in the sun. And as hydrogen passes through metal, it causes a chemical reaction that makes the metal brittle. Leaking hydrogen could also have an adverse effect on both global warming and the ozone layer.
Free hydrogen is extremely reactive. It is ten times more flammable than gasoline, and twenty times more explosive. And the flame of a hydrogen fire is invisible. This makes it very dangerous to work with, particularly in fueling stations and transportation vehicles. Traffic accidents would have a tendency to be catastrophic. And there is the possibility that aging vehicles could explode even without a collision.
On top of this, we must consider the terrific expense of converting from gasoline to hydrogen. The infrastructure would have to be built virtually from scratch, at a cost of billions. Our oil and natural gas based infrastructure evolved over the course of the past century, but this transition must be pulled off in twenty years or less.
Automobile engineers and others within the industry do not believe we will ever have a hydrogen economy. Daimler-Chrysler has admitted as much. Rather than developing a hydrogen economy, it makes more sense—and will always make more sense—to buy a more efficient car, ride public transport, bicycle or walk.
July 18, 2012
Harness The Stars
Quantum Meditation #1579
July 17, 2012
Peak Oil: A Non-Event?
Peak Oil: a Non-Event?
by PD Allen
Look for Murderer’s Sky; Book One of Under Shattered Skies
Download a pdf of this article (black print on a white background).
(pdallen.com)I have been hinting for some time now that the peak of world oil production, in itself, could be a non-event. While ‘Peak Oil’ has become the common term whereby we refer to the entire phenomenon of energy depletion, it is not so much the peak of production that we should be concerned with as the decline of production following the peak.
The oil peak could be defined as the time of maximized production. We have never produced more oil than at this moment in history. The peak tends to be the period of apparent super-abundance and greatest prosperity. Such was the case when the US peaked in 1970. At that time, the critics of peak oil theory were bragging that we had never produced so much oil in the US. What they did not know was that we would never again produce that much oil. This only became apparent after the peak, once US oil production entered an irreversible decline.
Right now, there is a lot of bickering about when world oil production will peak. Will it be this year (as gathering evidence seems to suggest), two years hence, the end of the decade, twenty years from now, thirty years from now? Personally, I think we have been flirting with the peak since the beginning of the millennium. 2005 might very well come to be known as the year of peak oil. Or it may be 2007. I think the odds are that the peak will come before the end of the decade. In fact, I expect that production will begin declining before 2010.
Peaks can be sharp or they can be drawn out. We could reach peak and begin the decline in a matter of months. Or we could reach peak in 2005 and hover there until 2007 or 2008, before we begin to decline. We could even have a series of mini-peaks over the next several years, each one linked to the next by a period of declining and then recovering production. It is quite likely that right now we are witnessing a tango between peak oil and the economy.
The tango is choreographed between demand and production. When there is spare production then demand will take the lead. The economy will prosper and demand will increase until it exceeds production. At that point, production will take the lead back from demand. The economy will falter as prices rise. Eventually demand will drop below production, allowing breathing space between the two. Prices will relax, and the economy will begin to recover, fueling demand to rise once again above production. Ostensibly, this tango could go on so long as there is enough floor space for the dancers.
In the real world, speculation could cut in on this dance at any point. Once investors perceive that the days of economic growth are over, there will likely be a market crash. We have already seen nervous investors and profiteering speculators drive up energy prices at any hint that there might be a problem with production. A wise strategy for the most powerful players, if they believe that a crash is eminent, would be to cash in their chips at a point of their own choosing before the crash, and then step aside and wait for the crash to reduce prices to the point where they can buy up what is left for pennies on the dollar.
While many think this is the probable scenario, it is all speculation. The truth is, humankind has never faced a situation like this in its entire history. Nobody really knows what is going to happen. It makes sense that an irreversible decline in energy production will spark a crisis in an economy based on the necessity of constant growth. It seems probable that our entire civilization will collapse, given that complex systems must change gradually and tend to react to sudden change with systemic collapse. And given the fact that we have done virtually nothing to prepare for this change, even now that it is breathing down our necks.
But the key here is not so much the peak as the end of the peak; that point when production begins to decline irreversibly. The most important question we should be asking right now is not when oil will peak but what will be the rate of decline once the peak has ended?
A gradual 2% decline could quite possibly be accommodated. Such a rate of decline, if it began by 2010, would mean that we would be producing as much oil in 2020 as we produced in 1990. There would be problems—the population has grown considerably between 1990 and now—but these problems would not be insurmountable. This decline rate is slow enough that we might be able to adjust naturally, transitioning smoothly into a more sustainable socio-economic system. This is, of course, barring panicked reactions. A global economic collapse due to market hysteria would make matters much worse than they need be. Likewise, energy wars would make the situation much worse for everyone, and possibly even lead to a nuclear exchange. But, barring such suicidal responses, a 2% decline rate might allow a relatively gentle transition.
There are some very strong arguments, however, that the decline rate will exceed 2%. It could be as high as 7 or 8%, and it is not impossible that it might be as high as 10 or 15%. Those who argue for these higher rates point to individual depletion rates of various fields that seem to average around 7%. A major cause of the higher depletion rates is new technology that makes production more efficient. These new technologies have the end result of drawing down the field quicker, leading to a higher depletion rate. It is unlikely that a depletion rate of 7% could be accommodated. This rate is simply too quick for transitions to occur naturally within a complex system. The system would lose its underpinning. Short of a global effort to direct all of our attention and energy to making a quick transition, the system would collapse.
Yet this is not the worst scenario. Unsound production practices have damaged many of the world’s major oil fields, as they have Ghawar—the largest oil field in the world. Should damaged fields such as Ghawar collapse, we could see oil production plummet by a whole order of magnitude within little more than a decade. The result of such a drop would be nothing less than the collapse of civilization, widespread suffering and starvation.
So this is the question that we desperately need to answer: what will be the rate of decline? To date, this question has been the subject of speculation and debate, but no one has been able to give a definite answer. This question can only be answered conclusively in one of two ways. Either we can make an honest and open assessment of all the world’s oil fields, their health and their rate of production. Or we can wait for time to show us the answer.
We need this answer in order to know what steps must be taken now. But too many of the players are refusing to reveal their hands. Too many are looking out for their own short term interest, too many are afraid of being culpable, and far too many are still in denial that there is any problem at all. As a result, we continue paddling blindly down the river, without knowing whether there is a rapids ahead or a waterfall.
Yet we can say that it is likely that there is white water ahead, and it would only be prudent to prepare for it. It is time to prepare. It is time to network with others around us, organize within our communities, time to take our homes off the grid and learn to produce at least a portion of our own food. The peak of oil production is not the event we need to be concerned about, it is what comes after. While we can still breath and hope, there is time to prepare; let’s not waste it.
July 16, 2012
Internal Vision
Quantum Meditation #1577
July 15, 2012
Murderer’s Sky Is Shining!
Murderer’s Sky is now on the market.
(nook will follow in a few months)
Under shattered skies, fifty-seven illegal immigrants are murdered outside of the town of Heater, Arizona, a dying town in a dying civilization. Their deaths in a ritual sacrifice awaken Sheriff Elliot Pierce, Father Albert Hayne, pregnant survivor Maria Diaz and all of the people of Heater to an evil as abhorrent as what is happening in the sky overhead, an evil that is linked to what is happening in the sky, to their fate and to the fate of the entire world.
Murderer’s Sky is the first book of the speculative, dystopian horror trilogy Under Shattered Skies. Set in a world not too different from our own, a world where humanity has passed the point of no return in its exploitation of the planet, a world where the monster threatening the future of life on this planet is the sociopathic inclination of its dominant species. Is there still a chance to save it all? Perhaps, but only if we can overcome isolationist tendencies and achieve a new degree of empathy with the world in which we live. Can that happen? Or are we damned to commit suicide by ignorance? Find out in Under Shattered Skies.
Under Shattered Skies of Our Own Design
Under Shattered Skies of Our Own Design
by PD Allen
Murderer’s Sky is now available ~ paperback ~ kindle
(nook will follow in a few months)
Download a pdf of this article (black print on a white background)
Stalking Wolf
(pdallen.com) Next to personal experience, the source from which I learned the most about living in and with nature is the books of Tom Brown Jr. Both Tom Brown’s field guides and his autobiographical books are a wealth of vanished knowledge. More than that, his books contain a perspective on life and the world in which we live which is essential to our survival and the nourishing of our existence.
Most of Tom Brown’s knowledge came from an Apache elder, Stalking Wolf. Stalking Wolf was a warrior, a scout, and foremost a shaman. Stalking Wolf could read nature as easily as you are reading these words. Tom Brown was fortunate enough to have become Stalking Wolf’s student when he was a young child. Stalking Wolf bequeathed the wealth of all he knew to Tom Brown, and Tom has passed it along to us through his books and his school.
It would be hard to exaggerate the importance I place upon these books. I consider them to be some of the most important books ever written. And so when I read of the great vision of Stalking Wolf, it shook me to the core. Stalking Wolf’s vision was of the collapse of civilization due to the inability of modern man to understand the intimate nature of his connection to the world in which he lives.
While the entire vision is too long to repeat here, I will quote one section. I urge readers to find a copy of Tom Brown Jr.’s book Grandfather for the entire vision. You can also find it at this website — http://www.dreamscape.com/morgana/rhea2.htm.
The relevant section to this discussion begins:
“It was at the end of the fourth day that the third Vision came to him. As he gazed out onto the landscape toward the setting sun, the sky suddenly turned back to a liquid and turned blood red. As far as his eyes could see, the sky was solid red, with no variation in shadow, texture, or light. The whole of creation seemed to have grown still, as if awaiting some unseen command. Time, place, and destiny seemed to be in limbo, stilled by the bleeding sky. He gazed for a long time at the sky, in a state of awe and terror, for the red color of the sky was like nothing he had ever seen in any sunset or sunrise. The color was that of man, not of Nature, and it had a vile stench and texture. It seemed to burn the Earth wherever it touched. As sunset drifted to night, the stars shone bright red, the color never leaving the sky, and everywhere was heard the cries of fear and pain.
“Again the warrior spirit appeared to Grandfather, but this time as a voice from the sky. Like thunder, the voice shook the landscape, saying, ‘This, then, is the third sign, the night of the bleeding stars. It will become known throughout the world, for the sky in all lands will be red with the blood of the sky, day and night. It is then, with this sign of the third probable future, that there is no longer hope. Life on Earth as man has lived it will come to an end, and there can be no turning back, physically or spiritually. It is then, if these are not changed during the second sign, that man will surely now the destruction of Earth is at hand. It is then that the children of the Earth must run to the wild places and hide. For when the sky bleeds fire, there will be no safety in the world of man.’
“Grandfather sat in shocked horror as the voice continued. ‘From this time, when the stars bleed, to the fourth and final sign will be four seasons of peace. It is in these four seasons they must live deep within the wild places and find a new home, close to the Earth and the Creator. It is only the children of the Earth that will survive, and they must live the philosophy of the Earth, never returning to the thinking of man. And survival will not be enough, for the children of the Earth must also live close to the spirit. So tell them not to hesitate if and when this third sign becomes manifest in the stars, for there are but four seasons to escape.’ Grandfather said that the voice and the red sky lingered for a week and then were gone as quickly as they were made manifest.”
The entire vision of Stalking Wolf shook me to the core when I read it many years ago. Eventually it served as the impetus for Under Shattered Skies. For the sake of the narrative, I have taken many liberties with this vision, but I believe the underlying message remains. Everything else in the book, from the adaptation of chemtrails into Project Rise and Shine to the plot to corrupt that project and the dæmonic assumptions and hive minds, were grabbed up intuitively to bring the third part of Stalking Wolf’s vision to life.
Of Our Own Design
For over a week now, I have been reprinting material on this site that would seem to be at variance with the theme of the site, and of much of the other material contained here — most notably Quantum Meditations. Yet I assert that all of the approaching crises presented in the papers of the past couple of weeks are of our own design.
I believe we are approaching a nexus in our own evolution. Before us are two main paths, one leads to extinction and the other to illumination. The history of civilization — and of western civilization in particular — is the history of a species divorced from the world in which it lives. It is the duality of ego and the other, an objectified and mechanical world without a soul where mankind justifies everything he does simply on the basis of his ability to do it while maintaining a separation from the impact of his actions. It is, in essence, a sociopathic perspective on life.
Our ignorance of our connection to the world in which we live and our own true identity have led us to this nexus where we now face a confluence of global crises, any one of which could exterminate our species and leave the biosphere tattered and impoverished for some time to come.
Or we can wake up into a new world where our identity does not end at our skin.
Homo Illuminus
To survive through the coming decades, it is time for humanity to wake up, hatch out of the ego egg that has bound us for hundreds of years, and grow up. It is time for us to follow the latest advances of physics and biology into a new world of self understanding.
Our identity and our existence do not end at our skin, or at the outer edge of our ego. We are intimately connected to everything that exists in this moment — so intimately connected that there is no point where one ends and the other begins. Everything that exists in this moment is our soulmate. Everything that exists in this moment is us. And waking up to this reality will carry us into a new world beyond our imagining.
Nor is this just a bunch of new age mumbo-jumbo. It has the weight of physics, biology and chaos/complexity theory behind it. In the theoretical physics of David Bohm, we form our reality in every moment from an implicated quantum field of holographic interference patterns, where everything is related and all possibilities exist. From this, we attract into our reality what matches the vibration of our thoughts — both conscious and unconscious — as amplified through our emotions.
And when we fully manage to step through that door, we will find ourselves in a wonderland beyond the dreams even of Lewis Carroll.
String of Pearls
Quantum Meditation #1576
