Chemist Tries to Solve World's Energy Woes

By Brian Bergstein, AP Technology Writer
Associated Press
Yahoo! News
Saturday, August 6, 2005

Cambridge, Mass. - A U.S. chemist is trying to determine
how the world will produce enough energy to supply 9
billion people by mid-century -- and whether that can be
done without pumping off-the-charts amounts of carbon
dioxide into the air.

Daniel Nocera, 48, is working to achieve an old, elusive
dream: using the bountiful energy in sunlight to split
water into its basic components, hydrogen and oxygen. The
elements could then be used to supply clean-running fuel
cells or new kinds of machinery. Or the energy created
from the reaction itself, as atomic bonds are severed and
re-formed, might be harnessed and stored.

There is a beautiful model for this: photosynthesis.
Sunlight kickstarts a reaction in which leaves break down
water and carbon dioxide and turn them into oxygen and
sugar, which plants use for fuel.

But plants developed this process over billions of years,
and even so, it's technically not that efficient. Nocera
and other scientists are trying to replicate that -- and
perhaps improve on it -- in decades.

Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe,
but it's generally locked up in compounds with other
elements. Currently, it is chiefly harvested from fossil
fuels, whose use is the main cause of carbon dioxide
emissions blamed for global warming.

And so while hydrogen fuel cells -- in which hydrogen and
oxygen combine to produce electricity and water -- have a
green reputation, their long-term promise could be
limited unless the hydrogen they consume comes from clean
sources.

That's where Nocera's method comes in. If it works, it
would be free of carbon and the epitome of renewable,
since it would be powered by the sun. Enough energy from
sunlight hits the earth every hour to supply the world
for months. The challenge is harnessing it and storing it
efficiently, which existing solar technologies do not do.

"This is nirvana in energy. This will make the problem go
away," Nocera said one morning in his office at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where the Grateful
Dead devotee has a "Mean People Suck" sticker on his
window. "If it doesn't, we will cease to exist as
humanity."

Lots of people have explored this challenge, but Nocera
had a big breakthrough when he used light to coax
multiple hydrogen atoms out of liquid. The key was
figuring out the right chemical catalyst.

Nocera's 2001 paper on the process in the journal
Science, written with graduate student Alan Heyduk,
turned heads. Venture capitalists rang his phone off the
hook offering to fund him in an alternative-energy
company.

The achievement, and its revolutionary prospects, won
Nocera this year's Italgas Prize, a $100,000 award given
annually by an Italian utility to a top energy
researcher.

"Dan is even-money (odds) to solve this problem," says
Harry Gray, a renowned California Institute of Technology
chemist who was Nocera's graduate adviser.

But there's a catch. In fact, there's a few, and they
illustrate how hard it can be to move alternative energy
beyond the proof-of-concept phase.

Nocera has performed the reaction with acidic solutions,
but not water yet.

The catalyst he used was a compound that included the
expensive metal rhodium. To be a practical energy
solution, it will have to be made from inexpensive
elements like iron, nickel or cobalt.

Nocera's reaction got the photons in light to free up
hydrogen atoms, but that's only half the equation. The
harder part will be to also capture the oxygen that
emerges when water molecules are split. That way, both
elements can be fed into a fuel cell, making the process
as efficient as possible.

Nocera and scientists not affiliated with his work say
those steps are achievable. But first, major advances in
basic chemistry will be necessary for the reactions to be
well understood.

As a result, Nocera believes it might be 20 years before
engineers might design systems based on his work. And he
frets that too few scientists are exploring the problem,
with many top minds instead focused on biomedical
research.

"This is a massive construction project," he says. "You
can go back to building New York City in the '20s and
'30s. You can't do it with just a few construction
workers. So I need more construction workers, more hard
hats, with me as a hard hat."

There's another big hurdle. While Nocera plugs away at
trying to save the world, some people don't believe it
needs saving.

Most scientists concur that continuing to burn fossil
fuels will send the amount of carbon dioxide in the
atmosphere -- it's now 35 percent higher than in
preindustrial times -- to dangerous levels, causing
global temperatures to rise with potentially devastating
effects.

"We are literally poisoning ourselves," Nocera says.
"People don't get it because they can't see it."

But this is a famously politicized topic in the United
States, where some powerful political leaders question
the science behind global warming. And that, many
scientists say, diverts attention and funds from trying
to solve the problem.

And even among people who believe global warming's risks
are too great to ignore, there is no consensus on what
kind of green energy should come to the rescue.

Nocera cites a calculation by Caltech chemist Nathan
Lewis that power demands in 2050 will be so great that
just to keep carbon dioxide emissions at twice
preindustrial levels, a nuclear plant would have to be
built every two days. There's not enough room on the
planet's surface for other widely touted solutions such
as wind and biomass to have much impact.

Only the sun is the answer, Lewis argues.

Critics of that vision say many energy technologies being
explored -- including improved ways of storing
electricity and different kinds of fuel cells -- will
come online in the next few decades and throw off today's
extrapolations about the future.

Arno Penzias, who won the Nobel Prize for confirming the
Big Bang and now invests in alternative energy startups
for New Enterprise Associates, contends there are dozens
of ideas more promising than ones involving hydrogen.

When told about Nocera's project, Penzias gets heated,
saying it is unlikely to be practical.

"It is so far from being revolutionary that it's not even
worth mentioning," Penzias says. "It will be a big yawn."


Nocera seems to thrive on such opposition, because he
expects to prove naysayers wrong.

It's part of his blunt enthusiasm, which manifests itself
when he discusses the joys of teaching chemistry to
freshmen ("They love me") or when he meets with his grad
students to discuss the status of their research.

Those sessions often devolve into arguments over the
meaning of some data or the direction that projects ought
to take. Provoked by Nocera's intensity -- he'll exclaim,
"I'm dying here!" in a tone resembling neurotic comic
Larry David -- tempers often rise.

One student recently threw an eraser at Nocera, leaving a
pink welt on his back that Nocera later showed off with a
laugh.

"There were times I absolutely hated working for him,
because he knew how to press all of my buttons and drive
me absolutely insane," says Heyduk, now assistant
professor of chemistry at the University of California,
Irvine. "He knew I was the kind of person that needed to
be challenged all the time."

Nocera believes this constant prodding at what's possible
is the essence of science. As evidence, he reels off
several ancillary developments from his research,
including microscopic sensors that detect biological
hazards, which attracted funding from the Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency.

Pointing to a whiteboard sketch of his vision for using
sunlight to split water, Nocera acknowledges that it
ultimately might not be an energy panacea.

"Is it right? Maybe not. But it will be something. And it
might be something I can't see right now," he says.
"That's OK. But you don't stop doing something because
you can't see it. It's antiscientific. It's anti-
intellectual."

More at:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050806/...energy_chemist

Jai Maharaj
http://www.mantra.com/jai
Om Shanti

Hindu Holocaust Museum
http://www.mantra.com/holocaust

Hindu life, principles, spirituality and philosophy
http://www.hindu.org
http://www.hindunet.org

The truth about Islam and Muslims
http://www.flex.com/~jai/satyamevajayate

The terrorist mission of Jesus stated in the Christian bible:

"Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not so send
peace, but a sword.
"For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the
daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in
law.
"And a man's foes shall be they of his own household.
- Matthew 10:34-36.

o Not for commercial use. Solely to be fairly used for the educational
purposes of research and open discussion. The contents of this post may not
have been authored by, and do not necessarily represent the opinion of the
poster. The contents are protected by copyright law and the exemption for
fair use of copyrighted works.
o If you send private e-mail to me, it will likely not be read,
considered or answered if it does not contain your full legal name, current
e-mail and postal addresses, and live-voice telephone number.
o Posted for information and discussion. Views expressed by others are
not necessarily those of the poster who may or may not have read the article.

FAIR USE NOTICE: This article may contain copyrighted material the use of
which may or may not have been specifically authorized by the copyright
owner. This material is being made available in efforts to advance the
understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic,
democratic, scientific, social, and cultural, etc., issues. It is believed
that this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as
provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title
17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without
profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included
information for research, comment, discussion and educational purposes by
subscribing to USENET newsgroups or visiting web sites. For more information
go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml
If you wish to use copyrighted material from this article for purposes of
your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the
copyright owner.

Since newsgroup posts are being removed
by forgery by one or more net terrorists,
this post may be reposted several times.

Chemist Tries to Solve World's Energy Woes

By Brian Bergstein, AP Technology Writer
Associated Press
Yahoo! News
Saturday, August 6, 2005

Cambridge, Mass. - A U.S. chemist is trying to determine
how the world will produce enough energy to supply 9
billion people by mid-century -- and whether that can be
done without pumping off-the-charts amounts of carbon
dioxide into the air.

Daniel Nocera, 48, is working to achieve an old, elusive
dream: using the bountiful energy in sunlight to split
water into its basic components, hydrogen and oxygen. The
elements could then be used to supply clean-running fuel
cells or new kinds of machinery. Or the energy created
from the reaction itself, as atomic bonds are severed and
re-formed, might be harnessed and stored.

There is a beautiful model for this: photosynthesis.
Sunlight kickstarts a reaction in which leaves break down
water and carbon dioxide and turn them into oxygen and
sugar, which plants use for fuel.

But plants developed this process over billions of years,
and even so, it's technically not that efficient. Nocera
and other scientists are trying to replicate that -- and
perhaps improve on it -- in decades.

Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe,
but it's generally locked up in compounds with other
elements. Currently, it is chiefly harvested from fossil
fuels, whose use is the main cause of carbon dioxide
emissions blamed for global warming.

And so while hydrogen fuel cells -- in which hydrogen and
oxygen combine to produce electricity and water -- have a
green reputation, their long-term promise could be
limited unless the hydrogen they consume comes from clean
sources.

That's where Nocera's method comes in. If it works, it
would be free of carbon and the epitome of renewable,
since it would be powered by the sun. Enough energy from
sunlight hits the earth every hour to supply the world
for months. The challenge is harnessing it and storing it
efficiently, which existing solar technologies do not do.

"This is nirvana in energy. This will make the problem go
away," Nocera said one morning in his office at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where the Grateful
Dead devotee has a "Mean People Suck" sticker on his
window. "If it doesn't, we will cease to exist as
humanity."

Lots of people have explored this challenge, but Nocera
had a big breakthrough when he used light to coax
multiple hydrogen atoms out of liquid. The key was
figuring out the right chemical catalyst.

Nocera's 2001 paper on the process in the journal
Science, written with graduate student Alan Heyduk,
turned heads. Venture capitalists rang his phone off the
hook offering to fund him in an alternative-energy
company.

The achievement, and its revolutionary prospects, won
Nocera this year's Italgas Prize, a $100,000 award given
annually by an Italian utility to a top energy
researcher.

"Dan is even-money (odds) to solve this problem," says
Harry Gray, a renowned California Institute of Technology
chemist who was Nocera's graduate adviser.

But there's a catch. In fact, there's a few, and they
illustrate how hard it can be to move alternative energy
beyond the proof-of-concept phase.

Nocera has performed the reaction with acidic solutions,
but not water yet.

The catalyst he used was a compound that included the
expensive metal rhodium. To be a practical energy
solution, it will have to be made from inexpensive
elements like iron, nickel or cobalt.

Nocera's reaction got the photons in light to free up
hydrogen atoms, but that's only half the equation. The
harder part will be to also capture the oxygen that
emerges when water molecules are split. That way, both
elements can be fed into a fuel cell, making the process
as efficient as possible.

Nocera and scientists not affiliated with his work say
those steps are achievable. But first, major advances in
basic chemistry will be necessary for the reactions to be
well understood.

As a result, Nocera believes it might be 20 years before
engineers might design systems based on his work. And he
frets that too few scientists are exploring the problem,
with many top minds instead focused on biomedical
research.

"This is a massive construction project," he says. "You
can go back to building New York City in the '20s and
'30s. You can't do it with just a few construction
workers. So I need more construction workers, more hard
hats, with me as a hard hat."

There's another big hurdle. While Nocera plugs away at
trying to save the world, some people don't believe it
needs saving.

Most scientists concur that continuing to burn fossil
fuels will send the amount of carbon dioxide in the
atmosphere -- it's now 35 percent higher than in
preindustrial times -- to dangerous levels, causing
global temperatures to rise with potentially devastating
effects.

"We are literally poisoning ourselves," Nocera says.
"People don't get it because they can't see it."

But this is a famously politicized topic in the United
States, where some powerful political leaders question
the science behind global warming. And that, many
scientists say, diverts attention and funds from trying
to solve the problem.

And even among people who believe global warming's risks
are too great to ignore, there is no consensus on what
kind of green energy should come to the rescue.

Nocera cites a calculation by Caltech chemist Nathan
Lewis that power demands in 2050 will be so great that
just to keep carbon dioxide emissions at twice
preindustrial levels, a nuclear plant would have to be
built every two days. There's not enough room on the
planet's surface for other widely touted solutions such
as wind and biomass to have much impact.

Only the sun is the answer, Lewis argues.

Critics of that vision say many energy technologies being
explored -- including improved ways of storing
electricity and different kinds of fuel cells -- will
come online in the next few decades and throw off today's
extrapolations about the future.

Arno Penzias, who won the Nobel Prize for confirming the
Big Bang and now invests in alternative energy startups
for New Enterprise Associates, contends there are dozens
of ideas more promising than ones involving hydrogen.

When told about Nocera's project, Penzias gets heated,
saying it is unlikely to be practical.

"It is so far from being revolutionary that it's not even
worth mentioning," Penzias says. "It will be a big yawn."


Nocera seems to thrive on such opposition, because he
expects to prove naysayers wrong.

It's part of his blunt enthusiasm, which manifests itself
when he discusses the joys of teaching chemistry to
freshmen ("They love me") or when he meets with his grad
students to discuss the status of their research.

Those sessions often devolve into arguments over the
meaning of some data or the direction that projects ought
to take. Provoked by Nocera's intensity -- he'll exclaim,
"I'm dying here!" in a tone resembling neurotic comic
Larry David -- tempers often rise.

One student recently threw an eraser at Nocera, leaving a
pink welt on his back that Nocera later showed off with a
laugh.

"There were times I absolutely hated working for him,
because he knew how to press all of my buttons and drive
me absolutely insane," says Heyduk, now assistant
professor of chemistry at the University of California,
Irvine. "He knew I was the kind of person that needed to
be challenged all the time."

Nocera believes this constant prodding at what's possible
is the essence of science. As evidence, he reels off
several ancillary developments from his research,
including microscopic sensors that detect biological
hazards, which attracted funding from the Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency.

Pointing to a whiteboard sketch of his vision for using
sunlight to split water, Nocera acknowledges that it
ultimately might not be an energy panacea.

"Is it right? Maybe not. But it will be something. And it
might be something I can't see right now," he says.
"That's OK. But you don't stop doing something because
you can't see it. It's antiscientific. It's anti-
intellectual."

More at:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050806/...energy_chemist

Jai Maharaj
http://www.mantra.com/jai
Om Shanti

Hindu Holocaust Museum
http://www.mantra.com/holocaust

Hindu life, principles, spirituality and philosophy
http://www.hindu.org
http://www.hindunet.org

The truth about Islam and Muslims
http://www.flex.com/~jai/satyamevajayate

The terrorist mission of Jesus stated in the Christian bible:

"Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not so send
peace, but a sword.
"For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the
daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in
law.
"And a man's foes shall be they of his own household.
- Matthew 10:34-36.

o Not for commercial use. Solely to be fairly used for the educational
purposes of research and open discussion. The contents of this post may not
have been authored by, and do not necessarily represent the opinion of the
poster. The contents are protected by copyright law and the exemption for
fair use of copyrighted works.
o If you send private e-mail to me, it will likely not be read,
considered or answered if it does not contain your full legal name, current
e-mail and postal addresses, and live-voice telephone number.
o Posted for information and discussion. Views expressed by others are
not necessarily those of the poster who may or may not have read the article.

FAIR USE NOTICE: This article may contain copyrighted material the use of
which may or may not have been specifically authorized by the copyright
owner. This material is being made available in efforts to advance the
understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic,
democratic, scientific, social, and cultural, etc., issues. It is believed
that this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as
provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title
17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without
profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included
information for research, comment, discussion and educational purposes by
subscribing to USENET newsgroups or visiting web sites. For more information
go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml
If you wish to use copyrighted material from this article for purposes of
your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the
copyright owner.

Since newsgroup posts are being removed
by forgery by one or more net terrorists,
this post may be reposted several times.

"Dr. Jai Maharaj" wrote in message
news:QeArO4647ItIno@TsiUf...
Chemist Tries to Solve World's Energy Woes

By Brian Bergstein, AP Technology Writer
Associated Press
Yahoo! News
Saturday, August 6, 2005

Cambridge, Mass. - A U.S. chemist is trying to determine
how the world will produce enough energy to supply 9
billion people by mid-century -- and whether that can be
done without pumping off-the-charts amounts of carbon
dioxide into the air.
Snip.......


A direct quite from the article:
"Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe,
but it's generally locked up in compounds with other
elements. Currently, it is chiefly harvested from fossil
fuels, whose use is the main cause of carbon dioxide
emissions blamed for global warming."

This idiotic and absolutely meaningless statement is a red flag that the
article may be devoid of facts or that it is a serious statement of actual
science being pursued. When one resorts to this statement it illustrates
that the writer has little clue about the science being reported and, in
general, is blowing smoke at an unsophisticated audience. Hydrogen is far
from the most abundant element on earth where we happen to live. If
abundance were an issue, silicon, aluminum or iron would be among the
elements of choice, not hydrogen. Clearly making that statement calls into
question other facts and assumptions of the article and is a warning that
the article may not contain much useful information.
Bob

"Daniel Nocera, 48, is working to achieve an old, elusive
dream: using the bountiful energy in sunlight to split
water into its basic components, hydrogen and oxygen. The
elements could then be used to supply clean-running fuel
cells or new kinds of machinery. Or the energy created
from the reaction itself, as atomic bonds are severed and
re-formed, might be harnessed and stored.

There is a beautiful model for this: photosynthesis.
Sunlight kickstarts a reaction in which leaves break down
water and carbon dioxide and turn them into oxygen and
sugar, which plants use for fuel.

But plants developed this process over billions of years,
and even so, it's technically not that efficient. Nocera
and other scientists are trying to replicate that -- and
perhaps improve on it -- in decades"


Solar cells are about 100 times more efficeint than photosynthesis.
Why not just hook up a few solar panels to an electrolyzer?

It looks like Dr. Nocera is trying to build a more efficient solar
cell?

The world has more important problems than running out of energy. The
world is running out of food.

One solution:
http://www.verticalfarm.com

Bob Eldred wrote:


Chemist Tries to Solve World's Energy Woes

By Brian Bergstein, AP Technology Writer
Associated Press
Yahoo! News
Saturday, August 6, 2005

Cambridge, Mass. - A U.S. chemist is trying to determine
how the world will produce enough energy to supply 9
billion people by mid-century -- and whether that can be
done without pumping off-the-charts amounts of carbon
dioxide into the air.

Snip.......


A direct quite from the article:

"Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe,
but it's generally locked up in compounds with other
elements. Currently, it is chiefly harvested from fossil
fuels, whose use is the main cause of carbon dioxide
emissions blamed for global warming."


This idiotic and absolutely meaningless statement is a red flag that the
article may be devoid of facts or that it is a serious statement of actual
science being pursued. When one resorts to this statement it illustrates
that the writer has little clue about the science being reported and, in
general, is blowing smoke at an unsophisticated audience. Hydrogen is far
from the most abundant element on earth where we happen to live.

I think the article doesn't make that claim. It says, correctly, that
"Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe". I think you
should look at this:
http://www.webelements.com/webelemen...xt/H/geol.html
http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_energy/h....cfm?pageID=88

wrote:

"Daniel Nocera, 48, is working to achieve an old, elusive
dream: using the bountiful energy in sunlight to split
water into its basic components, hydrogen and oxygen. The
elements could then be used to supply clean-running fuel
cells or new kinds of machinery. Or the energy created
from the reaction itself, as atomic bonds are severed and
re-formed, might be harnessed and stored.

There is a beautiful model for this: photosynthesis.
Sunlight kickstarts a reaction in which leaves break down
water and carbon dioxide and turn them into oxygen and
sugar, which plants use for fuel.

But plants developed this process over billions of years,
and even so, it's technically not that efficient. Nocera
and other scientists are trying to replicate that -- and
perhaps improve on it -- in decades"

Solar cells are about 100 times more efficeint than photosynthesis.
Why not just hook up a few solar panels to an electrolyzer?
[snip]

Because you cannot do aritmetic, git. The average solar cell over its
average operating life does not return the energy used in its
fabrication and deployment. Solar cells are all about in situ
convenience.

Area necessary to generate 1 GW electrical, theoretical minimum

Area, mi^2 Modality
====================
1000 biomass
300 wind
60 solar
0.3 nuclear

--
Uncle Al
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/
(Toxic URL! Unsafe for children and most mammals)
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/qz.pdf

"Dr. Homilete" wrote in message news:CNNJe.4104$lK2.2258@trndny01...
Bob Eldred wrote:


Chemist Tries to Solve World's Energy Woes

Cambridge, Mass. - A U.S. chemist is trying to determine
how the world will produce enough energy to supply 9
billion people by mid-century -- and whether that can be
done without pumping off-the-charts amounts of carbon
dioxide into the air.

A direct quite from the article:

"Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe,
but it's generally locked up in compounds with other
elements. Currently, it is chiefly harvested from fossil
fuels, whose use is the main cause of carbon dioxide
emissions blamed for global warming."

Most hydrogen is useless because it is locked in H2O.
However, trillions of tons of biomass have usable C+H.

This idiotic and absolutely meaningless statement is a red flag that the
article may be devoid of facts or that it is a serious statement of actual
science being pursued. When one resorts to this statement it illustrates
that the writer has little clue about the science being reported and, in
general, is blowing smoke at an unsophisticated audience. Hydrogen is far
from the most abundant element on earth where we happen to live.

There is more than enough hydrogen, but it isn't H2, convient, or cheap.
Yes, anyone who claims "hydrogen is abundant" is an idiot.

I think the article doesn't make that claim. It says, correctly, that
"Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe". I think you
should look at this:
http://www.webelements.com/webelemen...xt/H/geol.html
http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_energy/h....cfm?pageID=88

We don't live in space, do we? We have to make due with earth's resources.

Uncle Al wrote:
Because you cannot do aritmetic, git. The average solar cell over its
average operating life does not return the energy used in its
fabrication and deployment. Solar cells are all about in situ
convenience.

Then the average solar cell is not fully utilized. Here is an energy
payback study of solar cells that are fully utilized:

http://www.nrel.gov/ncpv/pdfs/24596.pdf

It is not the energy payback of solar that's the problem. It is the
return on investment. At around $25 a net watt, they are almost ten
times more expensive than coal.

Area necessary to generate 1 GW electrical, theoretical minimum

Area, mi^2 Modality
====================
1000 biomass
? didn't check. But I've crunched crop fuel numbers and they don't add up.

300 wind
Assumes the land between turbines isn't utilized? Sounds like a number
from the energy advocate. They can be scattered in farm lands.

60 solar
crunch.
http://rredc.nrel.gov/solar/old_data...redbook/atlas/
Fixed flat panel in AZ, call it 6kwh/day/m^2. 16% cells, 1kwh/day/m^2.
So 24E6m^2.

Or 9mi^2 for 1 GW.

Last time I crunch numbers I found there was 2 to 3 times as much land
dedicated to easements as would be required to supply all our energy
needs, including EV transportation. Put a square 60 miles on a side in
arizona to get a feel.

Nope, it isn't energy payback or land. It is cost.

0.3 nuclear

Ok.

P.S. The only practical thing I can see from here is that wind could
contribute 10% of grid demand in twenty years. Our real salvation is
nuclear. Then we make coal last longer for transportation fuels. It is
likely to take more than a century before we learn to get along without
fossil fuels. (If we ever do...)

Best, Dan.

--
Add one for email

In article .com,
says...


The world has more important problems than running out of energy. The
world is running out of food.

But his research is using things like photosynthesis as a guide and may
well lead to chemosynthetic ways to make food without the need for
plants or farms at all. That is the future.


--
Quibbler (quibbler247atyahoo.com)
"It is fashionable to wax apocalyptic about the
threat to humanity posed by the AIDS virus, 'mad cow'
disease, and many others, but I think a case can be
made that faith is one of the world's great evils,
comparable to the smallpox virus but harder to
eradicate." -- Richard Dawkins

"Dr. Homilete" wrote in message
news:CNNJe.4104$lK2.2258@trndny01...
I think the article doesn't make that claim. It says, correctly, that
"Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe". I think you
should look at this:

I got news for you. It doesn't matter what the abundance of elements in the
universe are....It only matters what we have access to. Maybe you can get
your hydrogen from Jupiter or the Sun or the Orion nebula but most of us are
earth bound and hydrogen is way down the list on earth so the statement
while true is stupid and meaningless. Furthermore making that statement
shows an utter disregard for where the element comes from or the energy
required to extract it. It gives the impression that hydrogen is just there
for the plucking. Meaning less as it is, that statement seems to crop up in
all kinds of popular literature on the subject. In fact, my point was that
seeing that statement is a dead giveaway that one is dealing with a popular
science type article and not a professional level discussion of the subject.
When you see it, there is little point in reading any further.