Synthetic fuel from green energy - News

[harryagain]

A couple of gliders have that technology. Dunno how well it works.

[harryagain]

Drivel. Without drag, no power would be needed in an aircraft once it reached the altitude required. The main part of the science of fuel economy revolves around reducing drag.

[harryagain]

Abandoned years ago. The product was inferior due to sulphur content.

[Tim Streater]

Let me refresh your memory:

[Simon Brown]

And he did in the sense that he was involved in producing what anyone who wanted one could buy. Yes, that was not unique, but I never said anything about unique.

Same with Ford. Yes, there was nothing particularly unique about the model T but it did have one hell of an effect on what was buyable at the time and that was another significant breakthrough.

Harry was stupidly claiming that that didn?t happen anymore.

He was just plain wrong. It still happens with software, most obviously with VisiCalc and Linux, both were quite different to what was before in the sense of what lots had access to because of what was done.

[dennis]

So stop referring to linux, that is only the kernel! Give some credit to the people that actually make the software work rather than Linus.

That's like saying the program we replace init and all the other stuff needed to boot unix with is unix, it wasn't it did a specific job of getting the application up and running much faster than using the traditional methods. It was done by ripping the source out of the various programs executed and combining it into one, it took more than

50% off the boot time.

But all the derivatives of Linux are kernels and nothing more.

They use a kernel based on Linux and a load of other stuff not based on Linux how is that any different?

I will repeat for the final time.. linux is not an OS it is a kernel written, at first, by Linus. The bits that make it an OS are open source software developed by others and they do not need Linux to run, just a unix like kernel and windows is close enough for the majority of software to work.

is a unix OS that, in the main, uses the same open source software and a different kernel, it is not linux and its what Apple use, not linux.

[Simon Brown]

No thanks, it?s a useful shorthand.

I never said anything about Linus.

Nothing like in fact.

Having fun thrashing that straw man ?

Wrong with what is used on smartphones and tablets.

Still a useful advance on what was there before.

That is ALL I ever said about it.

You can repeat this irrelevant line till you are blue in the face if you like, changes nothing.

I never said anything about that.

I never said anything about who did it.

Never said anything about that either.

Irrelevant to what is being discussed, whether Linux is a worthwhile advance on what was there before because it was open source.

Irrelevant to what is being discussed, whether Linux is a useful advance on what was there before it.

[Tim Streater]

Hmm, more wriggling, I see, more claiming you didn't say X when no one ever said you did (uniqueness, in this case). Meanwhile you're now saying he did make a significant breakthrough while at the top of this post I've quoted you claiming you never said that.

Do make your mind up, if you've got one.

[Simon Brown]

You clearly couldn?t find any example of me doing that.

[Tim Streater]

"Yes, that was not unique, but I never said anything about unique."

[Chris Hogg]

Of course it was. But that's not the point. It's perfectly practical to get metal and CO2 from metal oxide heated with coal, when you said it wasn't. You could even use ordinary raw coal if you use a hot blast furnace, see below.

The problem of sulphur contamination was overcome by the hot blast process, when even raw coal could be used, so you're wrong again.

Quotes from that article: "Other advantages in using hot blast were that raw coal could be used instead of coke" and "Hot blast allowed the use of anthracite in iron smelting".

Also "Anthracite was displaced by coke in the U.S. after the Civil War. Coke was more porous and able to support the heavier loads in the vastly larger furnaces of the late 19th century". No mention of an inferior product due to sulphur content.

So, wrong all round, shit-fer-brains.

[harryagain]

So why isn't it done nowadays? Because it was a failure. Producing an inferior product.

Lots of technolgies were abandoned as impractical.

[bert]

You mean like MSDOS and most of the other stuff from Microshit

[The Natural Philosopher]

yes. Its just a copy from something rather better than what gates copied. And developed by people who wanted it to work, not sell.

[Huge]

MS-DOS wasn't written by Microsoft.

[The Natural Philosopher]

It was ultimately.

I forget what Gates bought, but it was only a starting point. PCDOS was the result and IBM had a fair hand in that IIRC. NSDOS was a later evolution, and was vastly more code than the original system

But Microsoft has always been beyond teh early days a marketing company, not a technical company.

>

[Chris Hogg]

Not done because coke has a stronger structure than coal when in the blast furnace, so doesn't crumble and choke the furnace, preventing the passage of combustion and flue gases. Removing the sulphur by coking is obviously an additional advantage, but it's the stronger structure of coke that's more important.

But all that still doesn't get away from the fact that you _can_ get metal and CO2 from metal oxide heated with coal, when you said it wasn't possible. Whether it's commercially viable or done on a large scale today is irrelevant to that question. It is technically possible and was done in the past.

You're trying to deflect the argument because you've lost it, as you so often do.

[Huge]

Seattle Computer Systems Q-DOS (for "Quick and Dirty Operating System). It was the bastard offspring of CP/M and RT-11. Remnants of it still remain in Windows (drive letters - spit!)

[4 lines snipped]

Too true.

[Tim Streater]

Drive letters: So 1970s.

[John Rumm]

If you ignore the "green" aspect, then its a technology that may at some point be useful. In a world with abundant nuclear power, there will still be a demand for the energy density carbon fuels can deliver. So additional techniques to synthesise them from existing environmental carbon may become mainstream.

No need to ignore a technology, just because the spin someone sticks on it.