[ausev] AusEV Digest, Vol 31, Issue 8

[John Penry at TransTexasTrucks]

I went to a seminar on CNG fuels today.  Lots of rebate programs. Lots of grants, lots of Tax incentives. Lots of activities. If you own a fleet.

In the seventies, I had a friend who converted his van to gas or Propane at the flip of a switch.  What happened was oil got cheap and we all got used to it.  Now it costs $16,000 to convert an F-150. 

I used to live across the street from a nuclear engineer in Houston.  The plants are great, but what about the spent fuel?  Find somebody willing to stash it safely for hundreds of years.

My daughter lives outside of Lubbock.  There are a lot of wind farms up there, and I think they look terrific.  I often wonder why we don't have them lined up along the I-10 corridor.

So, there are many solutions, and they all fit together as a team.  Not one of them will work by itself. (Paris Hilton is right.)  But as the world oil supply has started to peak, I'm afraid we only have about 30 years left to find a solution.  If we keep buying gas and "hoping it will come down" it won't do anybody any good.

http://www.transtexastrucks.com
I decided to challenge the Automakers.
I will make a Plug in Series Hybrid Crew-Cab Pickup before Detroit does.
But if I lose this race, we all become winners.





  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Joby Wieser 
  To: ausev at austinev.org 
  Sent: Tuesday, August 12, 2008 7:10 PM
  Subject: Re: [ausev] AusEV Digest, Vol 31, Issue 8


        John,

         

        It’s easy to say “We should develop alternative energy”, but how do you propose that would happen?   The PV industry has been working hard for that cost /KW manufacturing breakthrough that would make solar cost effective for 40 years with very slow improvement.  The Wind farms only work in certain areas and they are far far away from population centers which is why T Boone wants the Feds to get into the transmission line business and even if he gets it built there still has to be a conventional power plant idling on line to back up the wing generation because sometimes the wind just stops blowing like it did for an hour this last march which triggered a capacity emergency that came very close to tripping off large interruptible customers.  As Wind generation becomes a larger percentage of the total generation mix this problem will increase without higher levels of spinning reserve.

         

        The bottom line is that the only economic alternative to fossil fuels, Is Fission fuel. Nuclear generation combined with an effective battery technology allowing more people to use electric cars that would be charged at night when demand is otherwise low is our best hope.  

         

        Joby



  




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