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MSTR style reactors use far less rare elements than most reactors, there's one example.
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Apr 19, 2016 19:37
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Rime posted:
If we get off of fossil fuels for fuel production & energy, those same fossil fuels will still exist. I don't know about the carbon impact of creating those products, but it's very small next to the impact of our transportation and energy networks.
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Apr 19, 2016 20:01
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Serious question from someone who does knows only very elementary organic chemistry: When fuel products like natural gas, kerosene, aviation fuel, and gasoline are separated out of crude and sold, how much of the remaining product is used? Is the consumption of fuel in balance with the consumption of petrochemical products? Stated another way: is there more petrochem in a barrel of crude than there is market demand for? Is there less? If we magically cut gasoline consumption in half tomorrow, will the leftover gasoline be useful for anything?
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Apr 19, 2016 20:08
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Potato Salad posted:Serious question from someone who does knows only very elementary organic chemistry: There is no remaining product, a successful distillation probably results in as close to zero waste as possible. You make paraffins of all sorts, naphtha, lubricants, fuel oil, jet fuel, avgas, LPG... Now as far as market demand goes. Obviously market forces at large dictate the need / price for all those products but there's also further orgo wizardry performed at an industrial scale like cracking or substitution reactions, so you can convert X molecule (C8H18, octane, for example) into whatever you feel like. Gas is an organic solvent with other uses besides exploding to power a piston, but it IS a rather large fraction of a given barrel so I'm not sure whether there's really a demand for THAT MUCH gasoline if we all of a sudden stopped fueling cars with it.
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Apr 19, 2016 20:19
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whitey delenda est posted:There is no remaining product, a successful distillation probably results in as close to zero waste as possible. You make paraffins of all sorts, naphtha, lubricants, fuel oil, jet fuel, avgas, LPG... To add onto this, there are some waste gases that get flared, but also refineries use a lot of heat/steam so most of the time any truly unprofitable waste in any significant amount can just be burned to fire the refinery.
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Apr 19, 2016 21:08
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CommieGIR posted:By Abbots logic we should've already run out, it ignores recycling of rare elements and newer reactor designs that use less of said materials. Don't forget, those reserve values are taken *at a given price point* which means nothing to nuclear reactors. The input materials are not where the cost comes from. whitey delenda est posted:There is no remaining product, a successful distillation probably results in as close to zero waste as possible. You make paraffins of all sorts, naphtha, lubricants, fuel oil, jet fuel, avgas, LPG... To add on a bit: We can also take that stuff that would have become gasoline and convert it into other petrochemical products. It does involve a fuckton of retooling, but it's totally doable. As long as we don't light the stuff on fire, oil and oil derived products is generally cool stuff. The Dipshit fucked around with this message at 21:44 on Apr 19, 2016 |
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Apr 19, 2016 21:38
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Trabisnikof posted:Also, non-fuel products make up only 7% of crude oil consumed in the US (the largest oil producer in the world atm), a rather small chunk of total oil usage. Likewise, Industrial emissions make up only 15% of US co2 equiv. emissions. Yeah, this is the core issue. Transport and energy generation are the primary emissions culprits, with industry right behind transportation, and everything else being almost irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. People who say that transitioning to nuclear (or renewables) would completely solve the problem are right, especially since wide adoption of electric vehicles wouldn't be too far behind. Coincidentally, this is exactly why this is such a frustrating problem. Human greenhouse gas emissions come from a pretty wide range of sources that are too complex to do away with completely, but we don't have to. We have to stop burning fossil fuels in a really limited number of ways to at least get to a point where this stops being an urgent, almost existential issue. The problem is that we don't have the political capability to actually do what needs to be done, so instead we're dragging our feet and hoping for an engineering miracle that probably won't come.
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Apr 19, 2016 21:51
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Paradoxish posted:
I think this is the core of the issue. It's a crazily complex systemic problem, like anything acting on a global scale. However it's patently obvious that the problem exists, the consequences are being observed in real time, and there is, if not an "easy" one-step solution, a suite of several "decent" solutions that just aren't being pursued because *~we'll figure something out~* ... we've already figured Things out! Damnit! Twenty years ago, forty years ago, different sets of people said exactly that, "We'll figure something out". Look, we did!
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Apr 19, 2016 21:56
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For what it's worth, I was firmly in the "we'll figure something out, there has to be an engineering solution" camp seven or eight years ago. I've come around, though. Yeah, fully transitioning to nuclear power would work. It would have been awesome if we started building reactors two decades ago, but that ship has sailed. We could still do it, just like we could probably figure out a way to transition to renewables, but it's not going to happen because it isn't a solution that the market is capable of implementing on its own at the speed required. It'll definitely be interesting to see how China's initiative works out, but that kind of thing is impossible in the US because we aren't going to fully nationalize the power industry (even though we should at this point).
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Apr 19, 2016 22:11
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I used to be in the room and gloom camp about 5 years ago, now firmly in the how do we mitigate this and adapt to the changes camp. Even too late is better than nothing.
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Apr 20, 2016 00:04
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Trabisnikof posted:Yeah but every single chemical engineer in grad school right now is working on some method to supply those needed feedstocks without using fossil fuels. Actually, ditto for Dow, DuPont, BASF, Bayer, etc. You don't need oil to make naptha after all. This is true and a good point to consider. I work in petrochemicals as an Environmental engineer. People don't realize that most formerly crude derived products now almost exclusively come from natural gas. Most feedstocks are lower carbon count chemicals so you can crack about any hydrocarbon and make stuff as market conditions allow.
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Apr 20, 2016 02:36
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Rime posted:The best part about discussing alternative energy sources is how it reveals the lack of grasp people have on infrastructure. This is generally correct, if a bit simplistic as was pointed out right below. The industry is a bit more adaptable to deal with different feedstocks than you've described. An interesting dynamic that highlights your point, however, is again Electric cars. If the pro EV crowd has their dream come true and all personal transport is accomplished by batteries and grid power, there's a huge gap now in materials coming out of crude refining. Demand for the lighter end HCs (gasoline) becomes basically zero or highly diminished. Now you've still got to produce all that heavier Jet Fuel and Diesel used to power flight and industry (trucks, earth movers, construction equipment, mining, boats, etc). You can presumably finagle the physics to make batteries and grid power work for transport, but flight and industry?  Diesel isn't going anywhere. This idealistic scenario forces you to either create extra waste as mentioned above or do silly things like start powering construction equipment with gasoline type HC fractions. For high torque applications, that's not only thermodynamically inefficient, it's horrible for the environment.This is why all the focus on EV/batteries as the next green hope is foolish in my book. We can do away with coal entirely using nuclear alone. Add better public transport, improve grid efficiency, deploy solar/wind intellegently, mandate fuel efficient vehicles and add hopefully plateauing/decreasing world population, maybe some sequestration and you may just might be able to stabilize and gradually decrease atmospheric carbon over the next century. Maybe I'm too much of an optimist *shrugs*
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Apr 20, 2016 02:59
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Lets perk things up with a story of a large energy company taking the farsighted, responsible appr... wait, whoops: EU dropped climate policies after BP threat of oil industry 'exodus'.
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Apr 20, 2016 15:08
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khwarezm posted:Lets perk things up with a story of a large energy company taking the farsighted, responsible appr... wait, whoops:
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Apr 20, 2016 17:42
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The EU's current climate change policies have lead to shutting down nuclear plants in favor of chopping down forests to burn in coal boilers, so I would keep it in perspective at least
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Apr 20, 2016 18:45
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oxsnard posted:The EU's current climate change policies have lead to shutting down nuclear plants in favor of chopping down forests to burn in coal boilers, so I would keep it in perspective at least Well it's not like it's our forests 
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Apr 20, 2016 18:53
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khwarezm posted:Lets perk things up with a story of a large energy company taking the farsighted, responsible appr... wait, whoops: quote:But EU proposals to label tar sands oil as more polluting than other oil – which could lead to additional taxes – risked companies “being penalised subjectively on the basis of adverse perceptions”, according to BP.
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Apr 20, 2016 19:35
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Everyone's favorite Quaker Oats cosplayer published an interesting paper on how the government is the perfect entity to spur renewable energy development: http://pdfsr.com/pdf/reprint-242-wc.pdf
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Apr 21, 2016 02:22
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Rap Record Hoarder posted:Everyone's favorite Quaker Oats cosplayer published an interesting paper on how the government is the perfect entity to spur renewable energy development: http://pdfsr.com/pdf/reprint-242-wc.pdf National labs: Quaker Oats edition Happy National Labs day ya'll :3
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Apr 21, 2016 05:55
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93% of the Great Barrier Reef is now damaged by coral bleaching Welp 
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Apr 21, 2016 16:43
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I was really hoping to get the chance to dive the Great Barrier Reef some day. Welp.
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Apr 21, 2016 16:55
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It's fine, we'll all be able to experience it in VR soon from the comfort of air conditioning....
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Apr 21, 2016 17:00
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How are u posted:I was really hoping to get the chance to dive the Great Barrier Reef some day. How ironic. Someone whose flights to and from the Great Barrier Reef will generate close to the annual CO2 emissions of the average world citizen is sad that CO2 emissions are causing the destruction of the Great Barrier Reef. And I see that you're popping down to Brazil this year too. Be sure to check out the rainforest before it's burned down to grow food to feed the cows that go into your Taco Bell burritos.
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Apr 21, 2016 17:22
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Placid Marmot posted:How ironic. If only we had gotten our electric planes online, so we could have flown them over our organic monoculture rainforests, and eaten our Taco Bell soybean tofu burritos. If only, then the barrier reef might still be alright. ;-;
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Apr 21, 2016 19:43
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Placid Marmot posted:How ironic. Are you stalking him to determine how much co he is responsible for
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Apr 21, 2016 20:07
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Isaac0105 posted:If only we had gotten our electric planes online, so we could have flown them over our organic monoculture rainforests, and eaten our Taco Bell soybean tofu burritos. If only, then the barrier reef might still be alright. ;-; Or, we could not hypocritically fly halfway around the world. Banana Man posted:Are you stalking him to determine how much co he is responsible for I just entered flights to Australia into an emissions calculator and looked up the average person's CO2 emissions, if you want to call that stalking.
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Apr 21, 2016 20:30
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Yeah but how many flights can I make if I refuse to have 20 kids? That's a lot of prevented emissions right there!
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Apr 21, 2016 20:32
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Apr 21, 2016 20:59
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Are you arguing with me using a cartoon, when I complain that the person who (in this very thread) has said How are u posted:Probably best not to think about it too much or you will get very depressed. How are u posted:hosed, we're all hosed. Don't have children. How are u posted:I was really hoping to get the chance to dive the Great Barrier Reef some day. yet continues to fly around the world? I'm talking about aproximately the worst thing that an average person can do, not "using a phone", "wearing clothes" or "having a tent".
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Apr 21, 2016 21:08
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Were you angry at Al Gore for flying on planes? vvv Very reasonable, thanks Mozi fucked around with this message at 21:24 on Apr 21, 2016 |
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Apr 21, 2016 21:14
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Mozi posted:Were you angry at Al Gore for flying on planes? Al Gore is one of the few people who can validly claim that their high-carbon lifestyle is more than compensated for by the influence that they have on other people.
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Apr 21, 2016 21:19
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Placid Marmot posted:Or, we could not hypocritically fly halfway around the world. I meant more along the lines of the Brazil thing. Please don't co shame
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Apr 21, 2016 21:27
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Banana Man posted:I meant more along the lines of the Brazil thing. I just looked at the summary quotes from pertinent-sounding threads in the first few pages of his post history - I can find some more examples if you'd like. [Not really - do it yourself]
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Apr 21, 2016 21:33
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To be entirely fair, any kind of individual sacrifice in the face of climate change is basically just self-flagellation anyway. You can't make a difference by not flying places, because the plane is still going whether you buy that ticket or not. Any individual purchasing decisions you make (or don't make) are too small to matter. Your purchasing decisions won't influence enough people around you for it to be meaningful. Thinking that you can actually make a difference outside of actual advocacy work and/or supporting groups that do advocacy work is just another way of saying that we can consume our way out of this problem. It's pretty silly to complain about someone being a hypocrite if they aren't, like, chartering private flights or running around all weekend on their yacht.
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Apr 21, 2016 21:52
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Paradoxish posted:To be entirely fair, any kind of individual sacrifice in the face of climate change is basically just self-flagellation anyway. You can't make a difference by not flying places, because the plane is still going whether you buy that ticket or not. Any individual purchasing decisions you make (or don't make) are too small to matter. Your purchasing decisions won't influence enough people around you for it to be meaningful. No, this is incorrect. If individuals opt not to fly or to eat meat or whatever, then demand is reduced and the service or product will be less profitable; YOUR single influence, as one person, is negligible, but the behavior of a population that is made of individuals does influence outcomes. If you hadn't noticed, all of the individuals in the world make up such a population, so the decisions of individuals in the world do have a cumulative effect on outcomes. If everyone were to listen to your advice that "you can't make a difference by not X", then we would see an even worse level of excessive consumption than we already have. By saying that an individual can have no effect, you are pushing responsibility for that individual's polluting onto other people. Not flying (for example) will not reduce the level of CO2 and other pollutants in the atmosphere, but it will prevent the release of pollutants that the average Westerner would produce in your place. It is certainly hypocritical to bemoan the effects of CO2 while being in the top few percent of the world's producers of CO2 because of your decisions.
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Apr 21, 2016 22:38
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You're missing my point by a pretty wide margin. You, as an individual living in a first world nation, likely have almost no personal responsibility for climate change. It doesn't matter what your carbon footprint is or how often you take part in high emissions activities like air travel. Your actual, real contribution to climate change is effectively nil, and the amount you can feasibly reduce that is even less. Take driving, for example. If you go out and buy a more fuel efficient car, you've reduced your carbon footprint. That's fine, whatever. You know what's infinitely better? Regulations requiring that cars meet certain fuel efficiency standards so that all new cars are more efficient. You know what's even better than that? Massively expanded public transport so that fewer people need to drive. Your individual contribution is meaningless in the face of the kind of sweeping changes that actually need to be made. Yeah, society is just a bunch of individuals. So what? If enough people were collectively making the right decisions then climate change wouldn't be an issue. If enough people were choosing not to fly, taking public transport or biking instead of driving, or just gave a gently caress at all then the political will to actually address this problem head on would exist and we wouldn't be having this discussion. It's stupidly counterproductive to berate people for flying when they go on vacation or whatever. If you want to poo poo on people for slacktivism, poo poo on them for not devoting their time and money to groups that are actually lobbying for societal change or politicians that recognize climate change for the looming crisis it actually is. Edit- And just to be exceptionally clear here, I'm not trying to be super pessimistic or say that nothing matters. You certainly can make a meaningful difference, it's just going to require a hell of a lot more than deciding to cancel a vacation or bike to work. Paradoxish fucked around with this message at 23:20 on Apr 21, 2016 |
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Apr 21, 2016 23:05
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I'm sorry you're mad about that guy but you could stop using heat and electricity because of the CO2 released from your personal use. Otherwise you're a hypocrite for calling that guy out but not making small sacrifices that will one day change nothing.
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Apr 21, 2016 23:09
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Paradoxish posted:You're missing my point by a pretty wide margin. This ignores how individuals can show leadership that lifestyles etc are workable. Buying a high efficiency car or appliance now does actually make it easier to pass regulation mandating it. Both because you prove it is workable and because you're improving the statistics and consumer buyin in efficiency. Sure, personal advocacy is more powerful than just a more fuel efficient car, but leading by example is an effective tool in advocacy.
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Apr 21, 2016 23:20
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Trabisnikof posted:This ignores how individuals can show leadership that lifestyles etc are workable. Buying a high efficiency car or appliance now does actually make it easier to pass regulation mandating it. Both because you prove it is workable and because you're improving the statistics and consumer buyin in efficiency. I'm not so much as ignoring it as discounting it out of hand. I'm disagreeing with the assertion that consumers (even acting collectively) can make a serious dent in our emissions. It's not economically realistic for a large enough segment of people to actually go out and buy more fuel efficient cars on a timescale that matters, for example. Even if it was, personal transportation is only one segment of emissions from transportation, and transportation on the whole contributes less to global emissions than energy production. This is fundamentally a problem that exists at a scale too large for individual action to matter.
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Apr 21, 2016 23:34
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Paradoxish posted:I'm not so much as ignoring it as discounting it out of hand. I'm disagreeing with the assertion that consumers (even acting collectively) can make a serious dent in our emissions. It's not economically realistic for a large enough segment of people to actually go out and buy more fuel efficient cars on a timescale that matters, for example. Even if it was, personal transportation is only one segment of emissions from transportation, and transportation on the whole contributes less to global emissions than energy production. This is fundamentally a problem that exists at a scale too large for individual action to matter. I think you underestimate the need for these proofs of concepts. Does a specific Tesla do poo poo for the climate? No. But would large scale battery production driving down battery costs have a positive impact on climate? Yes and you can't get the factory built without someone buying the (potentially lovely) cars first. Are most at home solar systems drops in the bucket? Yup. But if we wanted to regulate away the daytime peak the existing rooftop solar installs or geothermal heat pumps will be the examples used to show how doable it is. Leading by example is how we shift cultural expectations and that can be one of the most effective ways to change policies.
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Apr 21, 2016 23:49
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