9/11, ten years later
On this day ten years ago I was fighting my way through morning rush-hour traffic, going to an out-of-town plant to work on some production issues. After getting through the worst of it, I stopped for refreshment and another motorist told me that a small plane had flown into the World Trade Center. I switched from the CD player to the radio, and listened the rest of the way as the horror unfolded. By the time I got live TV coverage, the towers had collapsed. The TVs at rest stops showed the smoking rubble all day.
At my destination, people were desperately filling up every gasoline container they could find. I saw two men with a trailer full of brand-new 5-gallon cans, filling them all. I filled my car with enough fuel to get me through the week and home again. I had hoped to get a New York Times the following morning. I don't think I saw one that whole week.
The lack of contrails in the sky was eerie.
The agents behind the first (failed) WTC attack, and the suicide nature of the successful one, suggested strongly that it came from Islamists, specifically Al Qaeda. This was later proven; the attackers were from the Middle East, all Muslim, 15 of the 19 from Saudi Arabia. Our so-called "friends" there killed roughly 3000 people that day, mostly Americans, on American soil. Yet there was zero political response to this in Washington; while illegal Pakistani immigrants received a lot of attention and many returned home abruptly, the Saudi royal family was treated with kid gloves.
Nothing has changed in that respect. The US government has, against all reason, expanded allowances for Saudi immigration. Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad was admitted to the US in 1999 (after the first WTC attack) and granted US citizenship in 2009!
US immigration and citizenship policy is somewhere between reckless and suicidal. The question everyone should be asking is "Why?", followed immediately by "How do we fix it?"
It's easy to see why. The answer is "oil money". We have done precious little to wean ourselves off oil since 9/11 (Congress and the Bush administration continued policies of guzzler promotion for years after the attacks), and all those dollars flowing to Riyadh and Caracas and Kuwait flow back as political influence. We're not buying oil with dollars or grain, we're handing over control of our government.
It's imperative to cut US dependency on oil. The price of oil wouldn't matter to the economy if there wasn't an effective "petro-state tax" on most people just to get to work. I did what I could in 2004, when I cut my fuel needs by about 1/3. But today I'd find it hard to do that again. I'd need to get up to 60 MPG or so, and there are precious few vehicles sold in the USA which can do that. The Volt (sold out for months) is good for a couple iterations of this game and the latest Prius is in the ballpark, but the Fusion hybrid barely ekes out the mileage I often get today.
We've done practically nothing. We've continued to hand money and power to the people who've proven they will use it to do us harm. If it were only our elites I'd say it was treason, but sentiment among ordinary Americans is the same. See no evil, and drain the retirement account to fill up the pickup to take the toy-hauler and the 4-wheelers out for a weekend on the trails.
Fixing this requires a complete 180 in attitude. Oil must be treated as a necessary evil, but an evil. Guzzling vehicles and wasteful driving must be subject to both fines and social opprobrium. We need the PNGV or something like it back pronto, expanded production of all supply-chain components for hybrids and PHEVs (preferably all sited in the USA), feebates, higher gas taxes, the works. We can't manage a full war footing yet, but we need urgent action NOW. That attitude shift would help fix the flow of dangerous immigrants as well. We should have no Faisal Shahzads or Umar Abdulmutallabs or even Richard Reids coming into the USA.
I don't see this happening. Anyone who advocates any of the necessary changes is immediately stigmatized as "anti-American" (like R. James Woolsey?) or "islamophobic" (which is only half a step from "racist"). There's a stone wall, maintained by both major political parties, against making the changes we urgently needed to make starting on that clear sunny day ten years ago.
If this country doesn't wake up and get a clue, we're doomed.
Labels: 9/11, editorial, GM Volt, government incompetence, petroleum dependence, PHEV, PNGV, taxes
¶ 9/11/2011 12:39:00 PM 1 comments
Analysis from posts
GCC has a post on biomass-to-naptha schemes, upgrading pyrolysis oil to hydrocarbons. The projected cost is $2.11-$3.09 per gallon. My analysis follows.
2000 dry tons/day = 730,000 tons/year. The yield is 48 gallons/ton for the hydrogen production scenario and 79 gallons/ton for the merchant hydrogen scenario. (I calculate the carbon fraction captured in the product to be about 26% and 47%, respectively. This is not a very efficient scheme.)
If we take the figure of the 446 million dry tons of crop residues as a given, the potential output from this process is 21 billion gallons/year in the hydrogen-production scenario and 35 billion gallons/year in the purchased hydrogen scenario. (The question of the provenance of purchased hydrogen is significant.)
Even if the biomass supply can be doubled (or tripled), this scheme still falls short of providing BAU supplies of motor fuel. It can supply the liquid fuel needs of the PHEV component of an electrified fleet.
Labels: analysis, BAU, biofuels, PHEV
¶ 8/01/2010 02:55:00 PM 0 comments
EPA economy ratings vs. the GM Volt: A square peg in a round hole
What a difference a number makes.
The projected EPA economy rating of the GM Volt has set off a storm of criticism across the Internet. While a number of blogs played the story straight (1, 2), the Good Math blog attacked it as nonsense, which got picked up by Reddit. Critics say that the actual fuel economy seen by drivers could be as low as 50 MPG, or as high as infinity. So who's right?
Basically, they all are. The EPA city-cycle measures the Volt's characteristics about as well as a square peg fits a round hole. In this mess, the number you get depends how you trim the test to fit the car.
Green Car Congress gave a rather straightforward analysis:
Based on the same draft EPA methodology, the Volt would also deliver “triple-digit” combined cycle fuel economy along with combined cycle electricity consumption of 25 kWh/100 miles, according to GM. At the US average cost of electricity (approximately 11 cents per kWh), GM calculates that a typical Volt driver would pay about $2.75 for electricity to travel 100 miles, or less than three cents per mile.From the data we’ve seen, many Chevy Volt drivers might be able to be in pure electric mode on a daily basis without having to use virtually any gas. EPA labels are a yardstick for customers to compare a vehicles’ fuel efficiency. So, a vehicle like the Volt that achieves a combined triple-digit fuel economy is a game-changer...The key to high-mileage performance is for a Volt driver to plug into the electric grid at least once each day.—GM CEO Fritz Henderson
Since it's obvious that almost nobody would get that 230 MPG figure, or even ±10% of this value, it's worth asking: what does the prospective Volt buyer need to know? Off the top of my head, I can think of this:
- How much electricity they would use.
- How often they'd have to visit the gas station
- using gasoline
- using E-85
- Whether plugging in at work, or forgetting to plug in at night, would change those numbers substantially.
- Whether there are any electric rate plans which would make the car significantly cheaper to own.
- The overall monthly cost at various fuel prices and electric rates.
- Comparison with other makes and models.
This doesn't call for a flamewar. This calls for an on-line calculator, perhaps integrated with a mapping service which can project energy consumption on the typical commute, errands such as shopping, and trip to the relatives or the beach. But without adjusting for lead feet and hyper-milers, would anyone still get within 10%? The battle over the numbers does not look to end any time soon.
Labels: EPA cycle, GM Volt, PHEV
¶ 8/12/2009 10:15:00 PM 0 comments
Is the tide turning?
One of the more radical dreams of the true environmentalists (as opposed
to the anti-humanists who use environmentalism as a cover) is to convert
the world economy to renewable energy. They will not be fulfilled
until homes, factories and transport are using no fossil, nuclear or
other unclean, depletable energy supplies.This is a tall order, one that humanity has not met since the discovery of the useful properties of coal. Yet it remains worthwhile to keep the goal in mind, if not for the environment, then for our political and economic defense in the war declared against us by the Islamofascists. Randall Parker sets forth a standard by which we can measure our progress in one sense: when the alternatives to oil are cheaper than oil, the economic power of the Middle East will be beaten. Technology is unlikely to retreat, while depleted oil fields will never be more full than they are today.
The ideal scheme has always been the most expensive: the solar-powered car versus the status quo. Photovoltaic cells are one of the most expensive means of capturing energy from renewable sources, albeit also one of the simplest and lowest-maintenance. If a car receiving power from solar PV cells can deliver transportation at a lower cost per mile than gasoline, the millennium will have arrived. But could the millennium have sneaked in while we weren't looking? Let's take a look at the figures.
The beauty of electric vehicles is that most of the required infrastructure is already in place; we need no filling stations for new fuels or new pipeline networks. The new vehicle designs are ready to hand: we already have plug-free hybrid cars which attain 60 MPG and upwards, and if we add bigger batteries to such a hybrid we can make a plug-in hybrid or CalCar. More batteries does not just mean better acceleration and more efficient regenerative braking, it also means some operation without the need for any energy besides the stored electricity. We can build these cars today; we could (and should) have been building them ten years ago (but the litany of the sins of the California Air Resources Board is a rant for another day).
Suppose for a moment that we built such cars with today's technology and tried to power them as much as possible with renewable energy. How much would they cost to run?
The two major costs of the electric portion of such a vehicle are electricity and battery degradation. Let's start with batteries.
The current price-leader technology for storage batteries is the old, reliable lead-acid chemistry. It wins no prizes for energy density or lifespan, but it can be made for substantial power density and it is certainly cheap. Lithium-ion or fuel cells may be the ultimate winner of the technology race forty years hence, but if we can make things work with lead-acid we can get started immediately. We needed to get started in 1990, so we have no time to lose.
Depending on the chemistry and technology, batteries are limited by both cycle life and calendar life. If we take 3 years as a reasonable period between battery replacements in a car and assume daily use, we need approximately 1100 cycles from the battery if it is charged once a day and 2200 cycles if it is charged twice a day (say, at home overnight and again at work). If we refer to the cycle life vs. depth of discharge curve below, we see that if we want 2200 cycles of life we can discharge that model of battery by roughly 40%; if we only need 1100 cycles we can discharge the battery by roughly 50%.
Current electric vehicles consume roughly 200 watt-hours per mile. This seems to be a reasonable figure for conventional vehicles as well. If the vehicle is required to operate for 30 miles on electricity alone, it will require 6 KWH of electricity. At 50% DoD the battery pack would have to store 12 KWH, or 15 KWH at 40% DoD.
A commercially-available deep-cycle battery storing a nominal 1.2 KWH costs approximately $70 US at retail. If we assume that a battery equivalent to the Yellow Top can be built at this price, plus bulk discounts for production and purchase, we might see that drop to $60 or about $50 per KWH. A 12 KWH battery would cost $600; a 15 KWH battery would cost $750. The cost of energy storage for 2200 cycles to 40% DoD would be ($750/2200*6) = 5.7 cents/KWH; for 1100 cycles to 50% DoD, the cost would be ($600/1100*6) = 9.1 cents/KWH. The corresponding per-mile costs are 1.1 cents/mile and 1.8 cents/mile.
That takes care of the battery costs. What about the electricity to charge them? Solar PV panels produce DC, so it seems reasonable to assume a very high potential efficiency if they are being used to charge batteries more or less directly. Assume the net efficiency of battery plus charger is 80%, which yields 250 WH of PV output per vehicle-mile of travel.
The actual price of solar PV depends on too many factors to account for in an analysis this simple; however, the figure of $.25/KWH seems to be reasonable for the day. If we assume values from $.30/KWH down to $.20/KWH and run numbers, we get this range of projections:
If we assume wind or hydro power may be available at $.10/KWH retail, the figures look even better:
- $.30/KWH and 1100 cycles/3 years: 9.3 cents/mile.
- $.30/KWH and 2200 cycles/3 years: 8.6 cents/mile.
- $.25/KWH and 1100 cycles/3 years: 8.1 cents/mile.
- $.25/KWH and 2200 cycles/3 years: 7.4 cents/mile.
- $.20/KWH and 1100 cycles/3 years: 6.8 cents/mile.
- $.20/KWH and 2200 cycles/3 years: 6.1 cents/mile.
At this writing the retail price of regular unleaded gasoline is pushing $2.20/gallon in California. If the competition is a conventional internal-combustion engine vehicle burning regular gas at that price, I get the following energy costs for various levels of economy:
- $.10/KWH and 1100 cycles/3 years: 4.3 cents/mile.
- $.10/KWH and 2200 cycles/3 years: 3.6 cents/mile.
From the look of it, solar PV feeding plug-in hybrid cars can already deliver transportation to Californians more cheaply than any ICE-powered vehicle getting less than 20 MPG. If solar PV costs 20 cents/KWH and the vehicle runs its batteries for 2200 cycles between replacements, the cost is already par with a 35-MPG economy car. And if you assume the availability of wind or hydro power at 10 cents/KWH for charging, the plug-in hybrid can push energy-cost parity with the Prius.
- 12 MPG (typical big SUV): 18.3 cents/mile
- 16 MPG (typical medium SUV): 13.8 cents/mile
- 20 MPG (typical small SUV): 11 cents/mile
- 27.5 MPG (CAFE limit for passenger cars): 8 cents/mile
- 35 MPG (economy car): 6.3 cents/mile
- 60 MPG (2004 Toyota Prius, city rating): 3.7 cents/mile
It looks like the millenium may already be here. It's time to wake up and smell the coffee.
Cycle life vs. depth-of-discharge diagram for Yellow Top batteries.
(Graphic courtesy Optima, via Commuter Cars Corp. Copyrights NOT mine.)
Links and acknowledgements:
Costs of Oil Dependence: A 2000 Update
EPRI study on plug-in hybrid vehicles
Many thanks to the Institute for Analysis of Global Security, who compiled many of these links and did a fine job of documenting much of what I've been thinking about for the last several years before I found out about them. Also thanks to Randall Parker, who brought them to my notice.
Labels: batteries, hybrids, PHEV
¶ 3/13/2004 11:19:00 PM 3 comments
