Today is the 2007 Blog Action Day where bloggers around the world all write about how to help save the environment. It is an event supported by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Opera, Mokono, Reddit and a few other organizations and the website development, hosting and promotion is done by Eden.cc.
I’ve decided to discuss about renewable and clean resources. One, because it is the best way to clean up the atmosphere, and two because I can still talk about some technology!
Ethanol
First, I’ll start with my favorite, making energy with plants, Ethanol! Yes, energy from corn or other high in cellulosic plants. This is basically the best way to cure our oil addiction. Although it is not completely clean, it is 80% cleaner (according to Wikipedia) meaning it will help our planet a lot if it replaces oil, and it won’t be too hard to convert existing cars to work on ethanol. Thus, making this the best way to replace oil. The only problem right now is that we can’t get enough to totally replace gas. The actual process is simple enough to understand: Take a plant, extract the cellulose, and some enzymes to it and turn that into sugars. Then ferment the sugar and it turns into alcohol and distill into usable fuel. The only problem is that although cellulose is everywhere in plant cell walls making it a unlimited fuel source, cellulose is hard to break down. Nature has given many animals the power to do this, but harnessing them to do it quicker is not easy.
Right now, it is made mostly from corn, which is not the best source (It only produces 30% more energy that it takes to grow and process it (According to Wired Magazine)). Scientists now think that switchgrass is our best bet. This plant will produce 80% more energy than growing and producing it, much more than corn. The problem is, it can’t be produced at a cheap enough price to challenge gas.
Some people like Lee Lynd are approaching it as making an all-in-one factory. He is trying to create a bacterium that will take cellulose and spit out ethanol. People think he’ll do it, but how long it will take is the question.
Others are like Joel Cherry who want to make a cheaper enzyme. Cherry and his team after four years say that they have reduced the cost of the enzyme mixture from $5 per gallon of ethanol to under a dollar.
And finally the companies who want to find a better enzyme, like Verenium. Nature’s creations like termites process cellulose easily. They have taken the termite and removed the insides and together with the Department of Energy they want to find the genes that make it so good at breaking the tough molecule. After that they’ll try and find the best mix of celluloses.
Wind and Solar Energy
Wind, you feel that everywhere. The Sun, that’s just about everywhere too. Why not use it? According to Wikipedia, only 1% of the world’s energy is produced through wind turbines. There is an estimated 50 to 100 times more wind energy than biomass (Ethanol), most of which is at high altitudes.
Most wind turbines right now are firmly attached to the ground, and only harnessing the power of the wind close to the ground. Others that are attached to the ground under the sea are most effective since the wind come from the sea, but the most effective is in the air, preferably the jetstreams where winds are continuously over 100 mph.
A modern Wind Turbine near Aalborg, Denmark
A Solar Power Plant near Surpa, Portugal
All Images from Wikipedia.
Special Thanks to Wired magazine for providing info on Ethanol.
We should all take consideration into taking public transport. If not, try to buy an environmentally car such as the Prius (a new model is coming out –plug in/solar power–)
Kevin….really nice pictures you found
Well, I’ll bash ethanol around here.
First off all, as you pointed out, the US loves to use corn to make ethanol. Not only is this inefficient, it also raises corn prices, because with all the subsidiaries the farmers would rather sell it to ethanol palnts, raising food prices everwhere, and not just of ethanol. As you said, most scientists say swtichgrass is better now, but the farming lobby isn’t that happy w/ no as an answer.
Secondly, making ethanol requires a LOT of oil AND water. When you make ethanol, you’re fermenting the biomass. So you need to mix it in with a ton of water. Then, enzymes work optimately around ~98 F, so you need to heat your gigantic canister off biomass. And guess what? You use oil to heat that! (Either that or wait 20 yrs.)
Thirdly, ethanol can’t be piped the the exsisting oil pipelines (issues with any water mixing in would completely mess it up). Guess what (again)? Gigantic 18-wheelers have to be called into action. The population (and thus the usage of gas)is concentrated at the coasts, meaning that there will be long trips from the Midwestern farmland to the coasts.
Finally, corn isn’t nearly as energy eficient as gas. Altohugh it will eventually run out, gas returns at least four times as much energy per energy used to get it. (I think even more, but I don’t remeber off the top of my head). Corn only returns 30% more.
Oh yeah, the wikipedia article. It also counts the fact that we’re not bothering to transport it every where. I think it still is more environmentally friendly than gas, but you have to use more of it to go the same distance, so really it’s only about 40% more environmentally friendly.
Apologises for the long post!