Depressed... Oil prices are just gonna keep on rising and rising...

[Gfunkk44]

 

Originally posted by isaac42 Okay, but talk is cheap. what have you got? Who are some of these ambitious people with unconventional approaches?

 

 

In terms of Cold Fusion, Peter Hagelstein is one name that carries alot of the "thinking outside the box" mentality. The technology is still outside the practical realm... but if you told people in 1930 that you could split an atom, and harness an intense amount of energy from that, they would have either laughed, or had no idea what you were talking about.

 

http://rodan.physics.ucla.edu/pyrofusion/ , that site is an example of how cold fusion, essentially DOES exsist. Granted were not powering homes right now, but things come with time. These are people who are bascially bawked at, because they believe in a type of energy that is revolutionary. The type of energy is making developments, and hydrogen combustion, is lightyears more refined than that... yet people still don't want to believe there is alternatives to gasoline.

 

As far as hydrogen is concerned. http://www.germancarfans.com/news.cfm/NewsID/2040920.001/bmw/1.html , BMW has made great advancements with this engine, in part due to their continious valve timing. There are already so many advancements in place, that could be directly integrated into Internal hydrogen combustion engines. So not only do we get more power when we need it, but greater effiency when we don't need all the power.

 

To show you that this isn't perfect, and that im looking at both sides, here is a critisim of the hydrogen and fuel cell revolution.. http://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0009014 , what they don't mention in the article is that, H2 is the "fuel" along with O2. The final result would actually be water, air, and hydroxyl. H20 would be the dominant product, however, 01 would still be a product, which would instantly bond with other single O1 atoms... So oxygen will still be released... secondly, since water is being used to create the hydrogen, the cyle would continue ( granted we used electrolosis in water).

 

The real problem of hydrogen is and always will be the energy needed to produce it indefinatnly. What most people don't know is that, there are still many very large deposits of methane (commonly reffered to natural gas) left on the planet. We could harvest this as a great starter for hydrogen, much how we do now.

 

My point all along was not that this is an instant solution, but it's a very probable one.

 

Other things to check out, http://www.ford.com/en/innovation/engineFuelTechnology/hydrogenInternalCombustion.htm , hydrogen already in use http://www.fe.doe.gov/news/techlines/2005/tl_enabling_turbines_awards.html , a good book on hyrogen... not free though http://books.nap.edu/catalog/10922.html?referrer=Google , here is a link to many FAQ, the site does have some inherint biases, and doesn't address all the issues, but is still worth a look http://www.hydrogennow.org/Facts/FAQs.htm#1 , in additon to these links, my own limited experience with engineering, theromdynamic, and chemistry lectures and labs.

 

On that last site, (http://www.hydrogennow.org/Facts/FAQs.htm#1) look at the current cost of using hydrogen over gasoline... that is using methane... granted if we all started doing this the price would go up... however there is also a very large deposite of methan off the cost of flordia, it makes up part of the bermuda triangle... light estimates from the geological survey suggest that this is one of the largest deposits in the world, and better yet, suggest it may actually be better to remove it than to leave it there. http://www.stockton.edu/~biology/Platypus/methane.htm , http://www.earthsci.org/newsop/news/methane.htm ,

[isaac42]

If you're basing your oiptimism for the future on cold fusion, I fear you're going to be sorely disappointed.