In reply to Jones Beene's message of Sun, 3 May 2009 13:23:21 -0700 (PDT): Hi, [snip] >Yes but looked at another way that is 8% loss which is on top of the thermal >efficiency of the plant, correct? IOW a coal plant operating at 40% thermal >efficiency would suffer another 8% loss, compared to the original energy >content of the coal. A coal plant cannot be turned off at night, so there are >additional losses there. Plus the pollution. > >Since we can burn hydrogen anywhere- and the pollution is nil, and since the >efficiency of conversion is the same or higher - then it could possibly make >lots of cent$$$ especially in the more northern parts of the country to pipe >hydrogen, made from wind energy, to a small neighborhood "substation" sized >unit, make your electricity there, at 40% efficiency and up - in a converted >diesel - and use the waste heat for almost free hot water and home heating.
Just to make another point, some of the waste heat from large thermal plants can also be used for desalination, rather than simply being thrown away as it is now. This will become even more important in the years to come, as the population grows, and water becomes scarcer. This is a possible alternative to using the heat for central heating at the local level. [snip] Regards, Robin van Spaandonk http://rvanspaa.freehostia.com/Project.html
