New Tecnologies?

[mobetah]

The bad news is that crude oil now sells for over $140 US. The good news is that oil based tecnology might just be pricing itself right out of the market. I believe breakthroughs in solar, wind, hydrogen, HHO, tecnology (as well as technologys that I haven't even thought of yet) will soon be coming fast and furious. It's amazing what can be done when there is money to be made.

One example of such technology is explained on the following site for A123 systems A123Systems :: Home# They say they are developing the next generation of lithium Ion batteries. Who doesn't belive that hybrid boats won't be common place in the near future? Maybe even people like me with older boats can at least have an alternative to those all those heavy acid filled golf cart batteries.

So my question is ...... what other new energy technologies, spured on by the oil industries greed, do you think will effect the cruising boater?

[GordMay]

Nanotechnology:
Solar power generation efficiency is accelerating. While the cost/power equation was only improving at 5% a year for decades, new nanotechnologies are emerging that could accelerate that.

Nanosolar has developed proprietary process technology that makes it possible to produce 100x thinner solar cells 100x faster.
Nanosolar - Home Page

Advanced Diamond Solutions is developing thermionic solar cells using amorphous diamond nanostructures that offer potential efficiencies of 50% at half the cost of silicon solar cells.
Advanced Diamond Solutions Inc. -- Diamond Products for Energy, Semiconductor, Defense and More

Excerpted from “Clean-Energy Trends 2008"
Goto: Reports - Clean Edge - The Clean-Tech Market Authority

“Amid a challenging economic outlook—plummeting housing prices, rising foreclosure rates, record-high oil prices, sinking consumer confidence, looming recession—2007 was another banner year for clean energy, with no signs of a slowdown in 2008. Solar, wind, biofuels, geothermal, energy intelligence, hybrid- and all-electric vehicles, advanced batteries, green buildings, and other clean-energy-related technologies and markets provided bright spots in an otherwise sluggish economy...”

[speciald@ocens.]

Remember that a lot of petroleum products are used to make a fibreglass sailboat.

[DeepFrz]

Steve Dashew is now turning out a "production" aluminum boat. I imagine that steel boats too will be gathering more user acceptance in NA as the price of oil rises.

I guess this is not new technology, just a shift towards a different old technology.

[mobetah]

I did not mean to imply that oil would become worthless (far from it!). Many products now require oil to produce them (as in fiberglass and plastics) and I'm sure that many, not yet thought of, products of the future (such as medicines) will also require the use of oil. Today, however the vast majority of a barrel of crude oil is used in the production of energy products (gasoline, deisel, jet fuel, home heating oil. etc.). The rest of the barrel are byproducts (used in the production of fiberglass, asphalt, plastics, etc.). All the more reason not to burn all our oil up in the next 30 years or so ...... Don't you think?

[rossir]

Genasun

and

torqeedo: Produktbeschreibung

and

Electric bicycle batteries - what you need to know about Lithium ion batteries for electric bikes

Anyone else know about this technology?

[Pblais]

Who doesn't belive that hybrid boats won't be common place in the near future?

Me.

As the price of energy has risen in addition to the world demand for components used in batteries the battery prices themselves have skyrocketed even faster. The price of oil really has nothing at all to do with the money end of this new technology. There won't be more money because of the price of oil. There would be huge money for any proven technology with the profits far in excess of anything a spike in the oil price would cause. Ironically if US companies made breakthrough technologies in about any area the strengthening dollar would do more to reduce oil prices than almost everything else. Any future potential for alternative energy won't get oil prices down.

The down side is that claims of break through technologies are really a dime a dozen these days. You add the latest fad of investing for the reduction of the carbon footprint and that has unleashed a lot of energy scams. I expect the increase in scams will correlate.

The basics of battery chemistry were pretty well worked out 70 years ago. There may be subtle forms of improvements but the large storage capacity desired has yet to be approached. To create enough of it to actually show up in the total US energy numbers would take 40 years even with proven technology. If it happens I'm sure none of us will live to see it. The effort is clearly worthy and desired but the expectations seem far removed from reality.

[ssullivan]

I agree with Paul.

The advantage to hybrid technology for boats is more in terms of having extra electrical power. It's not so much for efficiency. You're still using diesel in the hybrid boat. It doesn't work like a hybrid car. There isn't any braking and there are few stop lights when using a boat. It's 100% power production 99% of the time.

[Pblais]

The real gains for boats is compressing the sq. ft. required to get the higher watts from solar panels. With 300 - 400 watts you can can talk about real power. It really won't effect the land based folks as much but with modern fridges and better solar you might be able to haul less beer than you can keep cold on the hook without running anything. Imagine getting a bigger boat so you can stay out longer so you can hold more cases.

[Erikte]

I really like the idea of wind generator big solar panel (+ 400 watts) and a http://www.africancats.com/resources...on_ENG1467.pdf system. Then ad a generator for those few occasions on need it. Less fuel is a good thing. The price in Norway for diesel is now ca 2.5 USD pr. LITERS (1 liter*3.8 = gallon) that gives ca. 9.5 USD a gallon, and the price is raising by nearly every day now.

[Amgine]

Frankly, I'd rather use the wind in my sails for motive power than a wind generator to produce electricity to power an electric drive. As far as I can tell, solar power arrays require far more energy to produce than they are likely to create in any reasonable service life aboard a boat; which doesn't mean they aren't useful on a boat, just that they don't reduce the carbon footprint in the slightest.

I have used a towed array generator - old used prop hooked up to a washing machine motor - which *very* quickly topped up the batteries. The boat was sailing about 4 kt, took about 4 hours. No, I have no idea how much energy it was producing, but it was owned by an electrical engineer with a Rube Goldberg bent.

None of these are new technologies. But the best not-new technology I've used to avoid flat batteries is setting the battery bank selector to off.

(In the fantasy setting, though, did anyone else see the University of Minnesota's research using thin film to split off pure hydrogen for fuel cells from alcohol or diesel/gas? no need for hydrogen tank, hydrogen infrastructure...)

[dacust]

Originally Posted by ssullivan

... It doesn't work like a hybrid car. There isn't any braking and there are few stop lights when using a boat. It's 100% power production 99% of the time.

What follows is not to disagree, but to add another point.

There are two ways a hybrid car saves on fuel, neither of which would apply to a boat.

1, which you point out, is that it re-charges under braking, capturing some of that wasted energy.

2, it uses that energy during acceleration. OK, we coulda guessed that, but it gives you something else besides simply using energy that would have otherwise been wasted. Since you have that added electric motor, the internal combustion engine can be smaller for the same acceleration. So, when cruising down the highway, you get the added savings of a smaller engine.

A hybrid gets better mileage on the road because it has a smaller engine. It get better mileage around town for the same reason, plus the added benefit of reusing braking energy. Since you are going at a slower average speed around town, there are actually some hybrids that get better mileage in town than on the road. A really efficient hybrid should get much better mileage around town, but due to inefficiency in power conversion and due to it only capturing a portion of the braking energy, they don't.

A tip for increasing mileage in your hybrid? Brake gently. When braking hard, the electric motor/generator can't provide all the braking, so the pads/rotors siphon some of that energy away in heat. Brake gently and the generator does most of the braking.

-dan

[Therapy]

Originally Posted by Amgine

As far as I can tell, solar power arrays require far more energy to produce than they are likely to create in any reasonable service life aboard a boat; which doesn't mean they aren't useful on a boat, just that they don't reduce the carbon footprint in the slightest.

Ahh....Yep!

[Bradley]

How can anyone claim that using solar panels has a greater carbon footprint than running a diesel engine for an hour or two a day.

Simple math 2 hours @ 1 gallon an hour @ $4.50 gal $9.00/day

I have 3 panels that make me energy independent. The cost to replace them would be about $2000.00. Payback is about 8 months. Panels should last at least twenty years.

Either solar panel manufacturers are absolutely nuts or the panels help to reduce MY carbon footprint. I would be very interested to see how solar panels are bad for the environment.

[Amgine]

You spend $210+ a month on recharging your batteries?

If you add all the invested energy in the solar panel, everything from collecting and purifying the silicon to putting into the packaging, and compare it to real energy output from the panel, you'll find it will probably take 20 years or so for your panel to produce as much energy as it cost. And, being honest, it probably won't last 20 years in a marine environment.

In contrast, your diesel probably produced its energy cost in about 500 hours of operation.

Once an energy-producing product is "in the black", then you can make a comparison of carbon footprints of operation. But until then you can't, because you're not comparing the whole carbon cost of that item.

But, what I originally said is that I prefer sailing to electric drives. And there are other ways of producing electricity beyond photovoltaic. Wind generation is hugely more efficient - in time - than pvc. But a towed array is even more efficient, because water is much more dense than air. So, if you're sailing, you can produce a pretty good portion of your electrical budget. Doesn't work at anchor, usually, but then you can break out the wind generator.