That's true for hydrogen and electric cars as well, there is no benefit in using electric cars, when all the additional electricity need will be supplied either by coal or gas (as here in Germany). Using Methan for Ammonia is just convienient and it makes more sense, than using electricity which is generated by burning Methan.
The difference between hydrogen, ammonia or petrol/diesel vs electric vehicles is the IC engined cars need their fuel at point of use, with all the infrastructure and inefficiencies that implies, while the EVs with central power generation can take advantage of efficiencies of scale, both for combustion and pollutant capture, and a multi-purpose energy distribution network, with fuel-less power generation from solar, wind or hydro where locally appropriate.
It's more the other way round, using chemical energy makes it possible to store and transport hughe amount of energy around the world. Solar energy can be extremly cheap in countries like Saudi Arabia (about 1 cent per kwh) or Australia, but getting the energy from there to let's say Germany is only practical in form of chemical energy (Amonnia, all types of other E-Fuels including Methanol) but not by wire.
Gas sations are allready there, no further investment will be needed and their cost are much cheaper than the hughe investment in the electrical grid which would be required for a wide distribution of electric cars.
The emissions of car exhaust gases are by far lower than that of any thermal power plant (exept nuclear), simply because politics regard combustion engines as evel and largly ignore the emissions of power plants (and airplane turbines....).
It's more the other way round, using chemical energy makes it possible to store and transport hughe amount of energy around the world. Solar energy can be extremly cheap in countries like Saudi Arabia (about 1 cent per kwh) or Australia, but getting the energy from there to let's say Germany is only practical in form of chemical energy (Amonnia, all types of other E-Fuels including Methanol) but not by wire.
Which I didn't rule out. My point isn't not using burnable fuels, but where you use them and what that does for efficiency. You can deliver them by sea or rail to a power station, but if you want to use the same fuel in an individual vehicle you've got to truck it to the petrol stations, generating low efficiency fuel expenditure en route; then everyone has to drive to the station to collect it - even if they're only going half a mile out of their way that adds up when spread over several million cars and a year; and finally the individual drivers have to lug it around everywhere they go, inefficiency again, and burn it at the point of use in a small engine without the efficiencies of scale available to a power station.
The electricity distribution net is already there, the point of delivery infrastructure is currently lacking, but installing it is a one-off cost, while the inefficiencies of IC vehicle fuel deliveries are continuing and unavoidable.
And the EV network can use non-burnable power generation, such as from wind (UK has 30GW wind generation out of a 75GW power capacity, with another 13 GW under construction against a target of 50GW by 2030).
A tanker truck can transport about 25.000 kg of fuel. Let’s estimate an average transport distance of 300 km from the next habour. Including the empty way back, this would result in 600 km on the road. With an average fuel consumption of let’s say 35 L/100 km the Truck would require 210 L which is less than one percent of the fuel transported.
I can’t speak for all countries, but here in Germany, the electricity distribution is already limiting the numers of charging stations and charging speed in many areas, despite we have a very low percentage of electric vehicles.
You should not underestimate the efficiency of combustion engines, in China, new future petrol engines must exceed 45 % efficiency, compare that to power station + cables + charging the battery + transporting the heavy battery + losses of FU and engine.
Ammonia was/can be made from electricity, water and air so could be produced on demand at the location where the fuel tank needs filling. Just like an EV but refuelled in minutes. However it’s makes far more sense to make in bulk in a sunny country with largely vacant land and ship it to grey skies population centres;- Ammonia is already the third most sea transported chemical in the world today.
Also as pointed out before, Ammonia is an excellent carrier of heat which means it enables a higher Carnot efficiency, which partially offset it lower energy density…. A 40% ICE with gasoline can be a 55% when run on Ammonia (with suitable htx recuperation)
Ammonia’s problem is it’s toxic which is a real barrier for automotive application, In applications where there’s a bit more discipline in handling and maintenance it might just be ok.
If I had to make anything mandatory--it would be repairability and redundancy...if you care about emissions first you lose votes.
But--if you insist upon a car whose internal combustion engine won't start still be drivable so as to not strand/kill the motorist--peoples faith in institutions can be restored.
Which I didn't rule out. My point isn't not using burnable fuels, but where you use them and what that does for efficiency. You can deliver them by sea or rail to a power station, but if you want to use the same fuel in an individual vehicle you've got to truck it to the petrol stations, generating low efficiency fuel expenditure en route; then everyone has to drive to the station to collect it - even if they're only going half a mile out of their way that adds up when spread over several million cars and a year; and finally the individual drivers have to lug it around everywhere they go, inefficiency again, and burn it at the point of use in a small engine without the efficiencies of scale available to a power station.
You realize that most of that has already been solved or considered a minor issue, right?
I put almost 700 miles on my car the week of Thanksgiving.
My farthest "detour" for fuel was about half a mile because they were installing an overpass and freeway exits instead of having people pull out in front of traffic moving 65mph. Otherwise, I drove maybe a couple hundred feet off the route I was taking anyways.
In town, you drive past half a dozen gas stations where I live. As traffic patterns change, the "best" location for a gas station does change, but that's a 20+ year thing to deal with.
15 gallons of gasoline is 90lbs of weight to carry around. When a car weighs 2400lbs, 90lbs of fuel is sometimes noticeable. When the cars weigh 4500lbs, 90lbs of fuel isn't even noticed.
The electricity distribution net is already there, the point of delivery infrastructure is currently lacking, but installing it is a one-off cost, while the inefficiencies of IC vehicle fuel deliveries are continuing and unavoidable.
And the EV network can use non-burnable power generation, such as from wind (UK has 30GW wind generation out of a 75GW power capacity, with another 13 GW under construction against a target of 50GW by 2030).
Which only works when the wind is blowing or the sun is shining. If you put dams on a river you block the fish (saw lots of "honor the treaty of 1855, breach the dams" on my drive up to Mom's for thanksgiving), waves might be a better option.
If you have access to deep water, you might be able to make some power off the temperature delta between surface and deep waters. But that's usually only a ~20degC temperature delta to work with, not very efficient but always available.
A tanker truck can transport about 25.000 kg of fuel. Let’s estimate an average transport distance of 300 km from the next habour. Including the empty way back, this would result in 600 km on the road. With an average fuel consumption of let’s say 35 L/100 km the Truck would require 210 L which is less than one percent of the fuel transported.
It's still substantially less efficient than running 50 tank cars (as you're talking about Germany, say a Zacns = 80m3 = 80,000l, *50 = 4,000,000l) into a powerstation behind an electric locomotive. Or just pumping it into their storage tanks direct from the tanker if they're conveniently located.
That got me thinking...if you pre-positioned nuclear lunar rovers in a line and each dropped some cable to join up the next--could you have a power line circumnavigate the Moon?
I know the US is a little weird when it comes to electricity distribution, but if the UK can run charging points off household supplies, I'm reasonably certain the US should be able to manage it. It might not be the fastest charging technology, but it's the one with lowest infrastructure costs. And if all you want is to top-up after the daily commute (UK average is 21 miles, round trip) overnight will do.
Which only works when the wind is blowing or the sun is shining.
Windy is pretty much our normal state of affairs, especially given half our wind turbines are offshore and spread out over hundreds of miles. And for the times when there's not enough wind, that's when you use stored power from places like Dinorwig (9.1GWh stored behind a dam, 50GWh planned for just along the road using disused quarries, another 55GWh going into schemes in Scotland), or tap into battery storage at solar installations, or have the power companies spin up another fuel-burning power station, or turn on the subsea power cables from Ireland, France, the Netherlands or Norway. There are even proposals for load-balancing tapping into household solar installations and their batteries on the individual household level as an expansion on them just selling power when the sun shines.
If you put dams on a river you block the fish ... , waves might be a better option.
My father oversaw blowing up a local 'dam' (actually a weir) in the drought of 1975 to ensure the fish could get upstream (OTOH the local fishermen never forgave him). But nowadays we're a lot better with fish ladders. There's a lot of dam-based hydro in Scotland, but new schemes are primarily tidal, rather than wave.
I know the US is a little weird when it comes to electricity distribution, but if the UK can run charging points off household supplies, I'm reasonably certain the US should be able to manage it. It might not be the fastest charging technology, but it's the one with lowest infrastructure costs. And if all you want is to top-up after the daily commute (UK average is 21 miles, round trip) overnight will do.
Except that most apartments in the US do not have a place to install an EV charger.
The people who have space for an EV charger usually own their homes, and are less concerned about their commute energy costs. Even my very nerdy parents haven't gone for an EV.
My father oversaw blowing up a local 'dam' (actually a weir) in the drought of 1975 to ensure the fish could get upstream (OTOH the local fishermen never forgave him). But nowadays we're a lot better with fish ladders.
Yeah, the US has seen salmon and steelhead runs go from "you could walk across the river on the back of the fish and not get wet" to "1 male returned to the spawning point". We've fought our way back from almost losing them entirely.
I'm honestly not sure which is less impactful. Tidal usually means dams and you get 4 peak power levels a day instead of more or less continuous power. Waves means you need lots more units because each wave is relatively small.
Instead of ammonia for fuel why not use whatever source of hydrogen you like to make synthetic hydrocarbon fuels? You have to look at the energy system, not one component. Anything that can generate hydrogen for ammonia could generate hydrogen for Bergius, Ficher-Tropsch, etc. Then, once the fuel is made, everything else stays the same, saving enormous amounts of money. Synthesis gas could be made by reacting CO2 and hydrogen. Also, check out the thermal generation of hydrogen by chemical means. They use waste heat at lower or higher temperature to drive cycles of endothermic reactions to make hydrogen and oxygen from water. The waste heat from various processes could be used as well as heat from a nuclear reactor or heat from concentrating solar power.
Ammonia is simply unsuitable as a fuel. It's part of the Green Grift that is gripping the world. It's a gas, it's toxic, it's somewhat corrosive. It is made from hydrogen in a process that requires a great deal of energy.
Also, the EV fans might want to check how much lithium, copper, cobalt, etc. the world actually has and how much would be required to switch to EVs. Every major automaker had ambitious EV goals, then they started walking those goals back. Mineral shortages is why.
Instead of ammonia for fuel why not use whatever source of hydrogen you like to make synthetic hydrocarbon fuels? You have to look at the energy system, not one component. Anything that can generate hydrogen for ammonia could generate hydrogen for Bergius, Ficher-Tropsch, etc. Then, once the fuel is made, everything else stays the same, saving enormous amounts of money. Synthesis gas could be made by reacting CO2 and hydrogen. Also, check out the thermal generation of hydrogen by chemical means. They use waste heat at lower or higher temperature to drive cycles of endothermic reactions to make hydrogen and oxygen from water. The waste heat from various processes could be used as well as heat from a nuclear reactor or heat from concentrating solar power.
Ammonia is simply unsuitable as a fuel. It's part of the Green Grift that is gripping the world. It's a gas, it's toxic, it's somewhat corrosive. It is made from hydrogen in a process that requires a great deal of energy.
Also, the EV fans might want to check how much lithium, copper, cobalt, etc. the world actually has and how much would be required to switch to EVs. Every major automaker had ambitious EV goals, then they started walking those goals back. Mineral shortages is why.
So where’s the carbon neutral carbon coming from to make the synthetic hydrocarbon? Extracting it from air (DACC) requires an astronomic amount of energy/resource , Bio mass takes a massive chunk of food production land …. All because “You have to look at the energy system, not one component”.
*Carbon Eng Ltd CO2 extraction technology;- to remove a Giga Ton of CO2 needs an extraction plant 4000km long powered by 75% of the current generating capacity of Europe.
It's still substantially less efficient than running 50 tank cars (as you're talking about Germany, say a Zacns = 80m3 = 80,000l, *50 = 4,000,000l) into a powerstation behind an electric locomotive. Or just pumping it into their storage tanks direct from the tanker if they're conveniently located.
That's not the case, as i've shown, the losses of fuel distribution by a tanker are below 1%,, the losses of distribution of electricity are far higher.
BTW what is a "Zacns"
@Zoo Tycoon Direct carbon capture is not as inefficient as one might think, because mainly low temperature themal energy is required. In a combined synthesis and DAC plant, the waste energy from the synthesis is fully sufficient to cover the heat required for DAC.
I think I linked a paper here somewhere and personaly I tend to lean more towards Synfuels than Ammonia, because the efficiency difference isn't that much.
I completely reject biofuels so let's get that out of the way.
IF we do carbon capture, it has to be by a low energy system. Maybe having large ponds that have a hydroxide salt that is cycled and the CO2 removed from the resulting carbonates. I'm not in favor of any of this, by the way. The solution is to get rid of automobiles except for fire, police, military. The techno True Believers and FREEDOM! crowds can't handle that though. Do the math. None of it works. None of it. The least bad way to provide hydrocarbon vehicle fuel is to ban anyone but police, fire, ambulance, and military from using it. The 2nd least bad method is carbon capture synfuels. Everything else is fantasyland. Actually, the carbon capture is fantasyland too. Private autos will not be a thin in 50 years, for sure. Maybe 20.
I completely reject biofuels so let's get that out of the way.
IF we do carbon capture, it has to be by a low energy system. Maybe having large ponds that have a hydroxide salt that is cycled and the CO2 removed from the resulting carbonates. I'm not in favor of any of this, by the way. The s%olution is to get rid of automobiles except for fire, police, military. The techno True Believers and FREEDOM! crowds can't handle that though. Do the math. None of it works. None of it. The least bad way to provide hydrocarbon vehicle fuel is to ban anyone but police, fire, ambulance, and military from using it. The 2nd least bad method is carbon capture synfuels. Everything else is fantasyland. Actually, the carbon capture is fantasyland too. Private autos will not be a thin in 50 years, for sure. Maybe 20.
There is a very elaborta study on this topic done by Prof. Koch from the KIT university. I allready linked it, it is in German, but Google translate works really great between German and English. You could read it, if you wan't to be informed, there are more than 100 different approaches of DAC involved.
You can find all the Math inside this study, with some intresting results, the total efficiency of electric energy to an hydrocarbon fuel is about 55-57 % which is only slightly lower than for Ammonia (60 %).
BTW one nice side effect of DAC is, that you not only catch the carbon, but also the water in the same process. As long as the air is not extremly dry, the catched water will be sufficient to run the process, so no desalination will be required.
Currently, wind and solar have capacity factors in the twenty percent range. That means you need to build 50GW nameplate of wind or solar to get 10GW out.
Studies have determined that with minimal (i.e. only multi-hour) battery storage (which is a heckuvalotta battery!), you need something on the order of a factor of five overbuild of wind and solar to ensure robust power supply. That's... 250GW nameplate total for 10GW of reliable power.
There are always some days when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine, it might only be a dozen days a year, but you can't suddenly call a national holiday because "the weather isn't cooperating today". I mean you can, but it's a very different way to run society now innit, and it'd screw with a lot of people's plans.
So you need storage - and it's probably going to be chemical, because you need to store this stuff for months - energy is needed seasonally in some parts of the world - and you're going to have to overbuild.
If you view the future as sun and wind and storage, green ammonia is not necessarily a terrible way to go; you've overbuilt your wind and solar farms by a factor of five anyway, might as well make ammonia during the off-hours to run everything else...
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1970s ammonia would likely have been nuclear, there were plans for the direct use of nuclear heat in industry, including in ammonia production. I vaguely recall some sort of energy island proposal with a bunch of reactors in some cold wild place manufacturing ammonia... ahh, the Agro-Industrial Complex. Imagine Jubail Industrial City, but with nuclear reactors instead of oil.
Nuclear processes were to provide inputs for all manner of primary industries, including the synthesis of NH3, hydrocarbons, Aluminium, and of course desalination, which would be fed into secondary industries (again in the manner of Jubail).
What SecretProjects post would be complete without the pretty pictures? Note 9. Ammonia Plant, and 10. Aluminium Production.
Remember, this was the sixties, when we still knew how to dream. Nuclear was going to bring light to the Third World, expand the horizons of industry, expand the domain of Man. The nuclear hovercraft studies, for instance, finished off by describing new hoverports servicing new cities along marshy, swampy shores that had hitherto lay abandoned for want of circulation.
A more modern treatise on nuclear industrial heat - note that there are some issues; you actually need a much hotter reactor than 1000C to effectively make hydrogen, there are heat transfer problems if you just run at 1000C.
Nuclear waste is a political problem rather than a technical one; the amounts are small, the world is full of holes you can dump stuff in, and nuclear waste recycling is well understood.
As you are no doubt aware, spent reactor fuel is excellent material from which to produce fast breeder fuel (that's what the French have been doing all this time; a lot of their reprocessed fuel was earmarked for their breeder program) - and as things stand, it is possible to burn certain categories of light water waste in CANDU heavy water reactors. There may be a concern regarding global proliferation, but if you're going with a atom-happy seventies you already have twenty nuclear powers by 2000 anyway (as per projections from the sixties). The Dutch will have nukes, the South Africans will have nukes, the West Germans will have nukes...
Low grade waste is more voluminous, but correspondingly much less hot to handle (and vastly outweighed by domestic waste); with appropriate institutions selected landfills will be adequate.
One option to generate Ammonia and E-Fuels are thermochemical processes which rely more on thermal energy than electric energy. Certain nuclear power plant types (gas cooled, to some degree also molten salt reactors) could deliver the thermal and electric energy for it. This would be much more efficient than using the electricity from a power plant alone, which is generated with about 35 % efficiency. The thermal energy could almost be fed with 100 % efficiency into the process (which itself is of course not close to 100 % efficient).
Currently, wind and solar have capacity factors in the twenty percent range. That means you need to build 50GW nameplate of wind or solar to get 10GW out.
UK offshore wind capacity factor is 41% (onshore 27.3%*). There's a lot to be said for building in the right places. And of course wind and solar tend to offset each other, a low wind day is usually a good solar one.
* And if you can get high 20s in the UK, you can probably beat it most places, though of course you'll never beat 50% with solar.
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