Solar Power Minus the Light 439
An anonymous reader writes "Popular Science is running a story about a small company trying to take advantage of all the global warming hype. Matteran Energy uses 'thermal-collection technology to heat a synthetic fluid with a very low boiling point (around 58F), creating enough steam to drive a specially designed turbine. And although a fluid-circuit system converting heat into electricity is nothing new, Matterans innovative solution increases the systems efficiency to a point where small-scale applications make economic sense.' Notably, this comes during a record breaking heat wave here in the US. So has the day finally arrived where I can run my AC off of all that heat outdoors?"
Re:Only solves 50% of the problem (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Only solves 50% of the problem (Score:5, Insightful)
Summer power consumption by aircon units determines max peak load on the power grid here in Melbourne, Australia. I think aircons should run primarily on photovoltaics because that way you get the highest power when it is needed the most.
Re:Very inefficient (Score:3, Insightful)
What matters, is the efficiency time-wise, space-wise or monetary cost-wise. Having twice as much power from the same heat would be nice, but it isn't the point.
our galactic stone-age (Score:3, Insightful)
Solar energy is yet expensive, but it's easy just to look at the effects of the crisis in middle east over the fuel price to understand that we need to start thinking differently when we're talking about energy consumption. Most of the house devices we have could work just slower and consume half of what they do now; but this is a lesson we were not yet trained to learn.
Our story resembles more and more with some Age of Empires game where we start on an island, burn out everything there is to burn over there, and then have no more resources to build transporting ships.
take a bath in the heatsink (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:our galactic stone-age (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:our galactic stone-age (Score:3, Insightful)
Last time I checked, there was sunshine and open spaces in a lot of places other than the Middle East.
Re:Only solves 50% of the problem (Score:2, Insightful)
Contrast that with considering replacing a traditional electric heat pump with a geothermal system. About twice the cost to install, but electric costs associated with using it drop tremendously, as in $225/month summer dropping to $80/month. This calculates out to paying for itself after only about five years.
Use Nature's Solar Panels (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Only solves 50% of the problem (Score:5, Insightful)
If you actually visit the company's website... (Score:3, Insightful)
The point of their system is not to be more efficient than solar panels, but to be MUCH CHEAPER. We don't have a shortage of energy from the sun... we have a shortage of cost-effective ways to harnass it.
-R
Re:Why? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:our galactic stone-age (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, there's lots of oil in other places also, so why does the middle east still control the world energy market? Easy, for the same reasons they will control the solar market.
1) Cheap labor
2) All their open land doesn't have any NIMBY neighbors to complain
3) No environmental restrictions/regulations
4) The open land cannot be used for anything else, especially crops.
The big downside they face is how do you transfer all the energy collected to the markets that need it? The great thing about oil is that it is extremely portable. Direct electrical transmission over power lines is hugely ineffecient and unreliable over even multi-state regions, let alone continent-wide or global distances. If only there was some ubiquitous power storage and transport system with high efficiencies to help the big middle east oil barons keep making money... hmm.. what's that.. GWB (Halliburton) is now supporting moving to a hydrogen based economy? Remember kids, hydrogen isn't an energy source, just an energy storage medium.
Is anyone still naive enough to think that all of this hasn't been thought about, researched, and planned for years? The global cartels know to the year, possibly to the month, when oil will be too expensive in recovery to maintain a strong global economy, i.e. current levels of comfort for the ultra rich. Spending large amounts of money on researching alternatives too soon just wastes current year investment income, and results of such research would interfere with pulling every last cent of profit from the current system. As soon as the money/lifestyle/economy equation balances you will see vast changes in the energy landscape, almost overnight. And the same people making huge profits now will still be making huge profits then.
Re:Why? (Score:3, Insightful)
Especially since I'd get paid pretty well for it.
Unfoutunately:
1- My backyard isn't big enough for nuclear waste disposal/storage.
2- Some laes restrict what I can do with my back yard.
Quick fix (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Only solves 50% of the problem (Score:2, Insightful)
But in the initial post he didn't say radiate cool. he said "radiant cold". if you're nitpicking semantics, stick to the right ones.
starting with a response to the validity of the term radiant cooling, it is just as valid as any other type of cooling. As said before, you never create "cold", i.e., destroy energy. You move it. Thus calling an effect heating or cooling is a relative term, and it is relative to the desired end temperature of the item of interest. your conventional room air conditioner doesn't create cold within your house, it heats the outside air by transferring energy to it from inside your house, leaving net less energy inside. Cooling just describes the end effect of that energy transfer on the interior condition of your house. Radiant cooling just means you've used the process of radiation to achieve a more comfortable personal heat transfer steady-state in your house.
Heating or cooling is a relative term. In either case your are just transferring energy from a hot item to a cold item. Even the terms hot and cold are relative. You are transferring energy from the item with more to the item with less. That item with less may seem hot relative to another item. If you say something is 'cold' you actually mean "it's colder than something else (your skin, etc.). If it 'feels cold' that means thermal interaction with it creates a transfer of heat from you body to the item.
So, radiant cooling exists as much as radiant heating, as either is just transfer of energy via radiation. The person stated originally, "if you didn't heat the house the basement would be the warmest part from the radiant heat in the walls vs the radiant cold upstairs". Radiant cold, being a relative term, means it is a colder radiant source than the comparative hot item, meaning it will be a net absorber of energy. It is an item which primarily transfers heat via radiation yet primarily absorbs energy from the other radiative participants.
He didn't say "thermal sink" or anything that involved the "injection of cold into the system" which wouldn't make sense. He never sugested violating physics, and didn't even invent the radiant cooling terminology (Google radiant cooling [google.com] or radiant cold [google.com]). Technically he was not incorrect in that respect, and this whole argument/thread about radiant cold is rather silly. But then, it's slashdot. What else should we expect :)
At least it was the DIFFICULT 50% (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, this new development solves the difficult part of the equation--it provides a low-cost way to capture that heat. The cold-side of the operation is the easy part. You are onto the solution already:
Power stations using closed fluid circuits (e.g. nuclear plants) use a secondary circuit to cool the first one after the steam passed the turbine. They are usually located near rivers for this.
Well, any residence, office or industrial space with electrical service would have water service as well. This water is brought in through underground pipes and is significantly cooler than the ambient temperature in the summer. This serves a dual purpose too--even in the summer we need hot water so after the vapour in the generation circuit releases its heat energy to the water in the cooling circuit the heated water can actually be used.
Of course, this isn't a total solution to our power needs for the most part, unless you live close enough tho the equator that it is always warmer outside than the temperature of the water brought in. Of course, up here in Canada half the time the situation is reversed--it is below freezing outside and the cold water coming in is warmer, so you could use a heat pump of sorts in reverse fashion. However, the technology described here wouldn't work passively in the winter becasue you couldn't boil even this low-boiling-temperature when it is 20 below freezing. Perhaps natural gas would work and still be quite efficient (cheaper than heating your water anyways).
I think this sort of research is exactly what we need to solve our energy consumption and environmental problems. Right now, there is way too much focus on a few huge projects to solve a few huge problems. Witness the ineffectiveness of Kyoto--yes most of the signatory nations will meet their targets but at what cost? France is permamently addicted to nuclear power generation, Germany didn't even have to try because their 1990 target included dirty, antiquated, cold-war-era east-german industry that needed to be modernised anyways. Russia has not been consistent in its commitment and also has a low hurdle to jump given that it had a period of economic contraction starting around 1990. Canada signed on then did nothing at all--its GHG emmissions increased at a rate twice that of the US--a country that didn't even ratify the accord. China, India and pretty much all of Africa are exempt and are massive polluters. So what was gained out of all the time and expense and bureaucracy? Absolutely nothing--and Kyoto only addressed one single environmental issue--greenhouse gasses. In the meantime there are polluted and improperly dammed waterways, acid rain, an ozone hole, asthma-causing smog, oil-dependency, etc. that have not been adequately addressed.
Instead of dismissing these small innovations they should be embraced. Whether it is solar energy, thermal-collector-powered heat engines or fuel-cells or whatever, being able to equip houses and other buildings with "personal power generators" would have a profound positive impact on the electrical grid and power consumption. Right now the grid is like the early internet--a huge network of unreliable connections with content (electricity) delivered from a small number of large, centralised nodes. Personal generators would make it like the internet--a large, unreliable network but with an equally large number of smaller nodes providing power. This would make the grid hugely more reliable. In the event of a network/grid failure a node/generator could still provide a certain level of content/power to its local network/building electrical system. In the event of a node/generator failure, the network/grid could provide content/power to the LAN/building. Also, less overall power would
Re:Only solves 50% of the problem (Score:2, Insightful)
It makes every bit as much sense to speak of something "radiating cold" as it does to speak of "hole flow" in a semicondutor, or indeed "conventional current" in any electric circuit. Relax.
Re:our galactic stone-age (Score:1, Insightful)