Idle thoughts re generators

[David W.E. Roberts]

See

for steam turbines powered by natural gas.

Started to Google, but as usual p*ssed off by the number of referral engines cluttering the place up.

[Set Square]

Actually, I'd like to be able to generate *all* my electricity from gas - not just in an emergency. Bearing in mind that the marginal cost per kWHr of (on peak) electricity is 3.6 times that of gas, I would save on fuel costs as long as the overall conversion efficiency was more than about 27.5%

[IMM]

External combustion Stirling engines are the best for power generation. Do a web search and tons of stuff comes up.

[David W.E. Roberts]

Not as simple as it sounds :-)

You have to add in the cost of the equipment.

Much the same kind of sums as:

(a) converting a vehicle to LPG (b) trading in a huge gas guzzler for a super efficient micro car

For (a) the payback is generally at least 20,000 miles. Given that, the payback for (b) will probably be even further away, assuming you spend more than £1200 on changing the car.

So our VW camper is still petrol and we still have the Volvo Turbo Estate :-)

However I would be interested to see a costed example :-))

Cheers Dave R

[Nick Finnigan]

Which it isn't; and you'd want batteries to handle the peak loads. Once you've got the batteries, you can store off-peak electricity.

[Set Square]

Yes, I know that the overall economics probably wouldn't be favourable. It just irks me that I spend more on electricity than gas, despite only using a third as much of the stuff!

[James Hart]

Would make an interesting talking point with guests when the lights suddenly increase in brightness for a few secs.

[Mark]

I keep a steam powered generator on my farm, we were 4 weeks without elec back in 89 so some sort of back-up was essential its also a wood burner so doesn't cost anything to run, just lots of Kw/mh keeping it fed. ;-(

[The Natural Philosopher]

You can run almost any IC engine of almost anything really. It just takes some fooling with the fuel system.

However running a system designed to inject liquid fuel, on

e.g. piped gas at low pessure, would not be trivial.

[The Natural Philosopher]

is where

some

Gibraltar.

downtime.

they are

load is

stage farther

derived from

to keep the

CHP may actually be a hugely green source of power. In Addenbrookes hospital, Cambridge thay have an incinerator alreeady for presumably used dressings etc. Or possible illegal immigrants. Who knows? Hooking up some water heating and and electricity generation to such is not beyond the wit of man.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Not with CHP, because the waste heat isn't wasted. Also an IC engine at constant load cand be rin far more efficiently than one that is starting and stopping all the time.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Or a model jet turbine. These run typically off propane to start anyway.

This way of burning natural gas (gas turbine) is I think already in use in some CHP power stations.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Definitely possible with 50 grands worth of gas turbine and generator :)

Do a google on 'natural gas turbine CHP'

Lots of stuff out there.

[IMM]

You also have the inferior combustion process of the IC engine. An external combustion unit: steam, Stirling are far better in this respect.

It depends on how often it starts and stops. A well designed system will prevent unnecessary cycling. Lubrication can be taken care of by the oil store under pressure which instantly give oil to all the bearings.

[IMM]

installations (which is where

uploaded/documents/ACFPLBwLaq7D.doc

really, as some

to that of Gibraltar.

scheduled downtime.

do what they are

constant, and the load is

goes one stage farther

methane derived from

skeleton power to keep the

Last week a North London borough said it will fine people who do not re-cycle. On TV an expert was arguing the point that re-cycling as a waste of time and uneconomical. He said that burning the waste is the best option all around: landfill, reduces fossil fuel usage, local heating of houses, etc, and that emissions are well within the regs pointing to the defra web site. His argument was well reasoned. He said re-cycling came about through the German Green parties who mistakenly thought it a good thing. The Greens became powerful forcing it through in Germany, who then forced it through the EU. No one has seriously question the re-cycling claims.

[IMM]

Ludicrous. Off the shelf piston and Stirling engines/gennys are run off natural gas.

[James Hart]

Can be used for cooling as well,

[Pete C]

Try adding -kelkoo -dealtime etc to your search.

cheers, Pete.

[Pete C]

Any references to this?

I would have thought recycling glass bottles and aluminium cans saves more energy than created by incinerating them, even recycling paper is likely to give a net energy saving. Also it's hard to see how incinerating something can create less landfill than recycling it, which creates no landfill at all. Did the 'experts' well reasoned argument cover all this....?

cheers, Pete.

[Huge]

It's the London Borough of Barnet.

Pointless waste of time & money, IMNHO.