Carbon-free shipping – using renewables to create ammonia by electrolysis during peak periods to be used as shipping or aviation fuel

Carbon-free shipping. (Ed. – ammonia makes a very good aviation fuel) Ammonia (NH3) could be used as a carbon free fuel for shipping. It could be made from atmospheric nitrogen combined with renewable energy derived hydrogen. Ammonia’s hydrogen could react with oxygen to power engines, turbines or fuel cells, emitting N and H2O. Oxygen pre-separation […]

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Gasification gets The Guardian treatment

Comments are invited on the two gasification articles found on the The Guardian website today. They seem to have been written on the basis of a Press Release, without much background checking. I don’t want a bad word said about the author, Alok Jha, who is lovely, but I really think we need to unpack […]

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Hydrogen – the green currency of the future

All governments have pledged to improve energy efficiency and reduce carbon emissions; this effectively means that the world must move to:

Electricity from nuclear, renewable or decarbonised sources
Hydrogen from renewable or decarbonised sources
biomass derived methane gas or hydrocarbon liquids or
heat as a by-product, or from biomass, solar or geothermal sources.

Of these electricity and hydrogen are purely manufactured energy vectors competing as intermediaries between energy sources and final consumers. In recent years the tide seems to have moved to electricity as the ultimate solution, but this article will take issue with this. This is principally because of the severe cost implications associated with either electricity storage or its corollary – demand side management.

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ENERGY EFFICIENCY AND CO2 COMPARISONS OF PUBLIC TRANSPORT VEHICLES

ENERGY EFFICIENCY AND CO2 COMPARISONS OF PUBLIC TRANSPORT VEHICLES

It was good to meet you yesterday at SET offices. As I mentioned there is an issue about the energy efficiency of public transport vehicles which you might be able to clarify for us.
I have urged James to publish comparison data on Sustraco website to show the energy efficiencies of different public transport vehicles. I am also discussing the issue in relation to work Temple Group is undertaking for clients in the railway industry.
On behalf of Sustraco I also made a submission to the Government of Australia Senate Standing Committee on Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport parliamentary inquiry into “Investment of Commonwealth and State funds in Public Transport infrastructure and services”. This energy eficciency issue is well stated in their report of Aug.09. I quote from para 3-33 pages 23 / 24 and footnote 28 thereto :-

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Biomass combustion plants – a Claverton member is interested in finding sites / locations with large capacity connections to the local power network or National Grid

A member of the Claverton Group is interested in finding sites / locations with large capacity connections to the local power network or National Grid – typically these might be defunct industrial sites, or existing industrial sites with spare capacity in an industrial sort of location where planning permission for a biomass combustion plant might be more readily obtained.

These are for biomass plants capacity 1 MW – 10 MW.

If you are aware of any please get in touch using the claverton contact form.

Kind Regards,

Dave Andrews

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