Jacob
New Luddism. Wake up and resist.
True but it's quite handy for skip divers like me.
You name it I burn it, as long as it is definitely very dry, "artisanal" or not.
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You name it I burn it, as long as it is definitely very dry, "artisanal" or not.
Keith Cocker
Established Member
The ones who criticise them are the thick ones.
worn thumbs
Established Member
I occasionally take a look at the Model Engineer forum and since there are some overlapping areas of interest,I don't suppose I'm the only one from this forum who does.This little gem appeared yesterday : What!! | Model Engineer .
I tried not to laugh.
I tried not to laugh.
Agent_zed
Established Member
I didn't attribute my comment to you, I stated/questioned what it seemed to be suggesting to me (note the question mark). You were clear in your objection to using wood/biomass and your only stated solution was nuclear fusion which is still pretty much theoretical at this point. As you were against the potential for sustainable biomass production I did (perhaps wrongly?) assume you were mostly against other sustainable energy production and therefore the only solution would be to continue with fossil fuels. I apologise for assuming you are not an advocate of other sustainable energy production but you gave no indication for that to be the case.
As for methane production from biomass/food waste you can indeed have it both ways. Do you know why the council collects your food waste? It's because it used to end up in landfill where it would rot and produce methane that had to be vented to the atmosphere. It now goes to anaerobic digesters where it is broken down and the methane is collected and used, which captures far far more than was escaping from landfill, whilst also lessening ground water contamination, overall volume of waste at landfill and providing fertilizer (which means less petrochemicals are needed) and methane (less fossil fuels needed).
Agent_zed
Established Member
because again it is part of a matrix of sustainable energy sources not the solution to the entire system. It also depends greatly on the country in question and their resources and waste streams. A scandinavian country with huge forest resources and timber production waste is going to be able to implement this easier than some other countries without this.
Keith Cocker
Established Member
The stupidity of the comment “I'm glad to see the government winding back the Nut Zero rhetoric a bit, Maggie Thatcher did a good job of massively reducing our carbon footprint by outsourcing most industrial capacity” beggars belief.
heimlaga
Established Member
I rekon that wood burning is a very sound and sensible and environmentally healthy heat source when it is part of a sound and sencible system starting from the pine cone and going all the way trough growing tree to firewood and up the chimney.
The problem being that this sound and sencible system requires changes in both woodland management and land use and the whole timber industry and land ownership and first and foremost in the minds of people.
I will try to outline the idea:
When woodland is managed in a way that keeps the ecosystem reasonably intact while taking up and storing fair amounts of carbon all while there is still an exploitable productivity you end up with a steady supply of high quality saw logs and a fair amount of tops and branches and small wastewood trees and rotten logs and such. Very little pulpwood. This cykle of production can be kept up indefinitely as long as you make sure all parts of it are intact.
Sawn timber provides us with a building material that stores carbon taken from the athmosphere and requires little energy input. That is sound especially if the things we build from it lasts longer than it takes for new timber to grow.
Then there is the rest of the tree and the undergrowth. Pulp mills cannot use rotten wood nor branches nor crooked logs. Neither can they use all species. The materials made from pulp are generally short lived bringing the carbon quickly back to athmosphere. Left to rot in the woods some of this waste is needed to maintain the topsoil and some of the carbon goes into the topsoil. However it is a serious fire hazard and most of the carbon goes into the athmosphere when the wood rots. We have all heard spoken of and seen the remnants of those gigantic wildfires that swept over the land centuries ago when no humans were managing the woodlands. There is also a surplus of biomass in the system. More than the topsoil can absorb.
By the way maintaining a healthy topsoil also implies no large scale clearcutting. Continous forestry or small scale clearcutting of no more than maybe a hectare at a time in places wher the soil is stable. Small twigs and leaves and tree stumps must be left in the wood to replenish the topsoil. Depending on local conditions more or less material must be left for that purpose and one must aim for a topsoil equilibrium.
A sensible use for that surplus biomass that can be taken out is firewood. To be used where it is most needed. That is to heat reasonably well insulated buildings during the coldest part of winter when there isn't much wind and not much sunshine. The firewood must also be used locally because transport emissions tend to eat up all environmental gains.
In order to have a system like this the whole woodland management system and timber trade must be reformed. Away from large scale clearcutting towards a patchwork of varous types of local adaptations of less invasive methods.
I also wiew it as very important to recreate lost woodlands. That is to plant trees on every piece of land where trees can grow and which isn't absolutely necsessary for aything else.
Most (not all) of the heaths and moors of England and Scotland and Ireland were woodland before farmers cut down the trees and let sheep graze there until no more saplings sprouted. Only in exposed coastal areas and in the far northwest was it too windy and wet for trees to grow. In some places this happened in neolithic times while in other places it happened as late as the 19th century. Anyway the "nature" you see is the remnants of a man made ecosystem collapse which can be reversed. The heaths of Germany and the inland sand dunes of the Netherlands and Denmark have a similar back story. The bare Swedish west coast came to be when the woods were cut down to render herring oil in the 17th and 18th century. The treeline in the Norwegian mountains receded several hundred height metres because all trees higher up were used as fuel for turning whey into brunost. The bare islands on south western Finland and Åland came to be because of over grazing and over logging starting in the middle ages and continuing almost into our time. At present most of Finland is threatened by the loss of topsoil caused by large scale logging with too brutal methods. Most of Spain was wooded until theheydays of the Spanish empire used it all up for shipbuilding and ore smelting. The barren Italian mountains were wooded until too much logging followed by overgrazing made the eecosystem collapse in Roman times. The barren Greek and Turkish hills and mountains are also the remnants of man made ecosystem collapses in ancient times. Even Iceland was fairly well wooded with low gnarly birches when the landnamsmenn arrived.
We could easily double maybe triple or quadruple the amount of growing tree biomass in Europe if we only wanted. Just imagine the stacks of timber and firewood people could harvest sustainably 100 years from now!
Imagine what it would be like to harvest coppice wood for firewood under the huge braches of timber oaks deep in the Dartmoor woods!
The main problem is that most Europeans have lost that direct tie to the woods.
My parents and I together own and manage 4,5 hectares of mostly mature woodland. We are experimenting with the goal to find forestry practices producing high quality timber and firewood sustainably to supply our own needs.
The problem being that this sound and sencible system requires changes in both woodland management and land use and the whole timber industry and land ownership and first and foremost in the minds of people.
I will try to outline the idea:
When woodland is managed in a way that keeps the ecosystem reasonably intact while taking up and storing fair amounts of carbon all while there is still an exploitable productivity you end up with a steady supply of high quality saw logs and a fair amount of tops and branches and small wastewood trees and rotten logs and such. Very little pulpwood. This cykle of production can be kept up indefinitely as long as you make sure all parts of it are intact.
Sawn timber provides us with a building material that stores carbon taken from the athmosphere and requires little energy input. That is sound especially if the things we build from it lasts longer than it takes for new timber to grow.
Then there is the rest of the tree and the undergrowth. Pulp mills cannot use rotten wood nor branches nor crooked logs. Neither can they use all species. The materials made from pulp are generally short lived bringing the carbon quickly back to athmosphere. Left to rot in the woods some of this waste is needed to maintain the topsoil and some of the carbon goes into the topsoil. However it is a serious fire hazard and most of the carbon goes into the athmosphere when the wood rots. We have all heard spoken of and seen the remnants of those gigantic wildfires that swept over the land centuries ago when no humans were managing the woodlands. There is also a surplus of biomass in the system. More than the topsoil can absorb.
By the way maintaining a healthy topsoil also implies no large scale clearcutting. Continous forestry or small scale clearcutting of no more than maybe a hectare at a time in places wher the soil is stable. Small twigs and leaves and tree stumps must be left in the wood to replenish the topsoil. Depending on local conditions more or less material must be left for that purpose and one must aim for a topsoil equilibrium.
A sensible use for that surplus biomass that can be taken out is firewood. To be used where it is most needed. That is to heat reasonably well insulated buildings during the coldest part of winter when there isn't much wind and not much sunshine. The firewood must also be used locally because transport emissions tend to eat up all environmental gains.
In order to have a system like this the whole woodland management system and timber trade must be reformed. Away from large scale clearcutting towards a patchwork of varous types of local adaptations of less invasive methods.
I also wiew it as very important to recreate lost woodlands. That is to plant trees on every piece of land where trees can grow and which isn't absolutely necsessary for aything else.
Most (not all) of the heaths and moors of England and Scotland and Ireland were woodland before farmers cut down the trees and let sheep graze there until no more saplings sprouted. Only in exposed coastal areas and in the far northwest was it too windy and wet for trees to grow. In some places this happened in neolithic times while in other places it happened as late as the 19th century. Anyway the "nature" you see is the remnants of a man made ecosystem collapse which can be reversed. The heaths of Germany and the inland sand dunes of the Netherlands and Denmark have a similar back story. The bare Swedish west coast came to be when the woods were cut down to render herring oil in the 17th and 18th century. The treeline in the Norwegian mountains receded several hundred height metres because all trees higher up were used as fuel for turning whey into brunost. The bare islands on south western Finland and Åland came to be because of over grazing and over logging starting in the middle ages and continuing almost into our time. At present most of Finland is threatened by the loss of topsoil caused by large scale logging with too brutal methods. Most of Spain was wooded until theheydays of the Spanish empire used it all up for shipbuilding and ore smelting. The barren Italian mountains were wooded until too much logging followed by overgrazing made the eecosystem collapse in Roman times. The barren Greek and Turkish hills and mountains are also the remnants of man made ecosystem collapses in ancient times. Even Iceland was fairly well wooded with low gnarly birches when the landnamsmenn arrived.
We could easily double maybe triple or quadruple the amount of growing tree biomass in Europe if we only wanted. Just imagine the stacks of timber and firewood people could harvest sustainably 100 years from now!
Imagine what it would be like to harvest coppice wood for firewood under the huge braches of timber oaks deep in the Dartmoor woods!
The main problem is that most Europeans have lost that direct tie to the woods.
My parents and I together own and manage 4,5 hectares of mostly mature woodland. We are experimenting with the goal to find forestry practices producing high quality timber and firewood sustainably to supply our own needs.
Sarcasm detector disabled this morning?
They're already here. There's overwhelming evidence and witness reports out there right now.
Not to digress too much. or take you too literally - but I've often wondered, whether it would actually be possible for something like coal to form again. Given that there are a variety of life forms now that would feed off the vegetation and break it down - before it ever had a chance to become coal.
But then I also wonder at how footprints can be preserved in the fossil record, given that even hard rock can be eroded by wind and water - let alone something soft and squidgy , like mud.
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I create coal from time to time in the ovenNot to digress too much. or take you too literally - but I've often wondered, whether it would actually be possible for something like coal to form again. Given that there are a variety of life forms now that would feed of the vegetation and break it down - before it ever had a chance to become coal.
But then I also wonder at how footprints can be preserved in the fossil record, given that even hard rock can be eroded by wind and water - let alone something soft and squidgy , like mud.
Jacob
New Luddism. Wake up and resist.
One odd thing is that woodland generally is cleared not for the wood, but because clear ground is wanted for agriculture, particularly meat which needs about 10 times as much land as an equivalent amount of arable production.
Where wood is well used there tends to be conservation, with steady supplies backed up.
I worked in Glasgow a couple of years back, just before the climate conference COP 26. They were bragging that all the police vehicles used were electric, what they didn't mention was the banks of heavy duty diesel generators needed to charge them as there was no infrastructure to power them.
Jacob
New Luddism. Wake up and resist.
Peat bog is the most viable equivalent in terms of carbon storage.Not to digress too much. or take you too literally - but I've often wondered, whether it would actually be possible for something like coal to form again. Given that there are a variety of life forms now that would feed of the vegetation and break it down - before it ever had a chance to become coal.
But then I also wonder at how footprints can be preserved in the fossil record, given that even hard rock can be eroded by wind and water - let alone something soft and squidgy , like mud.
heimlaga
Established Member
According to what I have read coal does form even in our time but because various life form eats most of the organic matter the amount is very very small.Not to digress too much. or take you too literally - but I've often wondered, whether it would actually be possible for something like coal to form again. Given that there are a variety of life forms now that would feed of the vegetation and break it down - before it ever had a chance to become coal.
But then I also wonder at how footprints can be preserved in the fossil record, given that even hard rock can be eroded by wind and water - let alone something soft and squidgy , like mud.
I believe that Lignite, the coal mined in the opencast mines in Germany, is in fact fossilised peat.
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I cannot see that burning wood is a sustainable, or indeed desirable thing on any meaningful scale. The amount of trees necessary renders it impractical on a large scale. And burning anything is surely best avoided if we want to maintain air quality. As to methane my objection was that you decried natural gas owing to the possibility of methane leakage. That is a fair enough concern but I dont see why you would think that biomass methane is somehow better. Why would you assume that would somehow be immune from leakage? And, much like wood burning, biogas is really not a serious solution on a large scale, it simply requires far too much raw material.
So for the sake of clarity the way I see things progressing is that we will have to continue to use fossil fuels for some time to come. Where this is unavoidable then it seems entirely sensible that those who can use what is on their own doorstep, rather than importing it. We aim to reduce our dependence on these fuels as quickly as possible by expanding current proven green sources like wind and solar, hydro etc. We also aim to develop effective ways of reducing the emissions from fossil fuel plants whilst they still are In use. I believe this is particularly important as many developing countries that are rich In these resources will be slower than us to abandon them, so anything we can do to reduce their impact is helpful. In the longer term we look to crack the fusion problem, I suspect this will only be done with much more international co-operation and funding. I believe we might well see a viable fusion reactor within 30 years, probably less if we really apply ourselves to the problem. We also need to get the same interest in issues like deforestation, and for the international community to start putting more pressure on those responsible. We are in a better position to actually monitor this than ever before, so should be able to bring pressure to bear both politically and commercially on those countries that continue to chop down rainforest, to plant oil palms for example. How will this go, who knows. Much of it is dependant on politicians, and very few seem to be prepared to really get a grip of it. Trump looks increasingly, likely to win the next presidential election and, unless he has radically altered his views, that may effectively take the US out of any serious efforts to halt climate change. This would be a serious blow to global efforts to address the problem.
This just popped up in my YouTube feed. It’s an interesting discussion on Hydrogen as a fuel. It’s from six months ago triggered by a report in the U.K. so pretty current. To cut to the conclusion hydrogen is not a silver bullet.
Agent_zed
Established Member
It depends on our willingness to increase forestry within the UK, but some other countries are in a place to do this already.
Including coal and oil? Also as I stated industrial gasifiers are pretty much as clean as any other burning powerstation.
Did you bother to read my reply at all? I'll repeat it once again in a simpler form - If you don't collect food waste it will create methane in landfill and has to be vented. If you anaerobically digest it you get fertiliser and usable gas. I'm not sure I can explain it any simpler.
It's also not just leakage from pipes and transport, oil wells need to be vented 'Every year, U.S. oil and gas companies set fire to billions of cubic feet of natural gas and directly vent an additional unknown amount.' Oil and Gas Companies ‘Flare’ or ‘Vent’ Excess Natural Gas. It’s Like Burning Money—and it’s Bad for the Environment - Inside Climate News
The uk produced 9.5million tons of foodwaste https://lordslibrary.parliament.uk/food-waste-in-the-uk/ in 2018. Seems like a lot of raw material to me. Coupled with the fact that this food production required huge amounts of petrochemicals to produce. For 1 litre of veg oil it takes about 3 litres of petrolchemicals. Seems a bit stupid to dump this in the ground when you can recycle it, reducing your waste stream and producing 2 useful products. Besides countries are already doing this! 'Denmark, a leader in biomethane production, which already has 26% home-grown biomethane' Biomethane offers rapid and safe alternative to expensive, imported, ‘natural’ gas
Oh course we will continue doing that because there are a lot of people with money invested in fossil fuels who want to remain rich and a lot of people like you who don't really care about making any meaningful change because something will come along to save us all in the future (in your case Fusion). When Texas got hit by unusual cold weather a few years back it knocked out their power grid. The companies were quick to blame the wind turbines for not running, despite the fact the gas generator were also knocked out because they failed to invest in the required cold weather equipment. But the oil/gas companies don't want you to know that do they, they want you to believe Windmills bad, oil/gas good. That 'genuis' Trump even says wind mills cause cancer?!
By opening new oil wells and mines? Yep investing a load of time and money into new oil wells is sure to spur those companies on to closing them as quickly as they can.
I mean if 'we' try really really hard and skip a few coffee breaks maybe we could do it in 20 years (or some other random number)!
Lets just hope if they do work it out that there isn't a nuclear fusion accident in it's early days, I guess we are lucky there has never been any nuclear fission accidents.....
Yes, including our own country.
Bit much to say they can't chop down their trees for palm oil but we are allowed to open new oil wells and coal mines. isn't it?
No he doesn't! He is a shoe in for the republican nomination but his overall popularity is not as great as you might like to think. There is always a chance, but despite the propaganda, Biden is delivering a strong economy with unemployment way down and low inflation. Trump is delivering anti-abortion retoric that is not going down well with 70% of Americans. That's if he doesn't go to Jail for his attempted coup and/or classified docs.
worn thumbs
Established Member
I live few miles from a large forest that was planted with a view to providing pit props.We don't actually have much need for such things at present.Which makes me wonder if we might be doing more with researching ways to make the most of the energy sources we have or if we ought to just gradually replace some mediocre pine trees with something more useful.Is there recent research into either clean gasification of coal?
On a slightly different path,we have a National Grid,so why hasn't more been done to create an International Grid? Would it be beyond us to set up a few million solar cells in some of the world's vast deserts and convey it across national borders? It could transform the economies of quite a few nations.
On a slightly different path,we have a National Grid,so why hasn't more been done to create an International Grid? Would it be beyond us to set up a few million solar cells in some of the world's vast deserts and convey it across national borders? It could transform the economies of quite a few nations.
