No, its to avoid putting additional co2 and other such chemicals into the environment. the algae is all gas that has been removed from the environment. nice cycle. Remember, those of use that actually use logic know that a single approach will not work.
On Sun, Apr 26, 2009 at 10:51 PM, Harry Veeder <hvee...@ncf.ca> wrote: > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: mix...@bigpond.com > Date: Monday, April 27, 2009 0:57 am > Subject: Re: [Vo]:Not what Algore wanted to hear > >> In reply to Harry Veeder's message of Sun, 26 Apr 2009 23:45:08 - >> 0400:Hi, >> [snip] >> >If you want a reliable and continous supply of power, solar and >> wind >> >will not give you that unless you can figure out how to store the >> >generated power cost effectively. >> [snip] >> As already discussed frequently on this list, solar can be captured >> and stored >> using algae. This is essentially what we are already using when we >> burn coal. >> We would just be shortening the cycle time from millions of years >> to months. >> While wind and solar don't actually supply continuous electric >> power, they are >> also not as bad as you might think. To start with wind may be >> variable, but if >> connected to a continent wide grid, then the wind is always blowing >> somewhere,which helps to reduce the size of the "bumps and >> hollows". Solar would supply >> direct power only during the day, but then that is also when most >> power is >> needed. At night, energy stored in the form of biomass could >> supplement that >> supplied by wind, to ensure a continuous supply. >> Furthermore, as I have also pointed out in the past, it should >> prove both >> feasible and cheap to store energy as heat underground in molten >> salt. At the >> temperature at which common table salt melts, the Carnot efficiency >> could be as >> high as 62%. This could provide a means of storing solar energy >> through the >> night at a cost up to 1000 times less than that of lead-acid >> batteries.If the solar energy is collected in a desert where there >> is very little cloud >> cover from day to day, then storage for much more than a day would be >> unnecessary, particularly if multiple solar plants contributed, >> that were >> geographically widely distributed. >> >> Then there are also other clean power sources that can contribute >> during the >> night - hydro, tidal, geothermal. >> In short, by utilizing an effective mix of different clean sources, >> a reliable >> power supply can be achieved, without fossil fuels, if we really >> wanted to. >> Regards, >> >> Robin van Spaandonk >> > > Isn't the point of adopting solar and wind power to avoid burning > combustibles? > Growing a biomass like algae as a source of fuel seems to defeat this. > On the other hand if we eat the algae... > harry > > >
