[SGVLUG] [OT]Hybrids and trains (was fuel prices and the dollar)

[David Lawyer]

Here's my responses and comments to various posts.  I'm doing it this
way since I somehow accidentally deleted the Hybrid and train thread
that I initiated and had to get the posts from the archive, so they
were not in my mail system format.  And I really appreciate the high
level of knowledge of the participants and their avoidance of ad
hominem slurs that are all too common in other discussions like this.

> From: x at xman.org (Christopher Smith) Date: Wed May 14 09:39:40
> 2008
> In truth though, airplanes are much more fuel efficient than
> that.  Modern aircraft typically get 3.5 litres per 100 passenger
> km, or roughly 70 miles per passenger gallon, which does seem like
> 10x worse than some of the more fuel efficient trains, but if you
> look at American rail systems, the fuel economy is much, much worse
> (I imagine partly due to low occupancy rates), so that might be how
> it balances out. In general, the jet has the advantage of less
> friction, although that whole "staying aloft" thing works against it
> a fair bit.

For a history of passenger-miles/gallon for air transportation, see my
 "Fuel-Efficiency of Travel in the 20th Century"
http://www.lafn.org/~dave/trans/energy/fuel-eff-20th-3.html#air_eff

For 2000 it's about 38 pass-mi/gal, but it seems that between 2000 and
2005 there was about a 17% improvement.  So if it is a 25% improvement
by today, it would be about 47 pass-mi/gal(gasoline), not 70.  Where the 70
likely comes from is that it's 70 pass-mi/gal(kerosene) for certain
flights or carriers (kerosene has a higher heat content).  Also,
perhaps it's just for flights between points in the US where the fuel
carried is less.  A long flight (like trans-ocean flight) will often
carry about 1000 lb. of fuel per passenger and having to increase the
"angle of attack" to keep the plane in the sky increases fuel
consumption.

Amtrak gets about 40 pass-mi/gal so it's worse than airplanes.  I
checked on reported train efficiencies in Europe and Japan where they
use electric trains and they fail to take into account that it uses
about 3 units of fossil fuel (or atomic energy heat) to generate 1
unit of electricity, resulting in reported train fuel efficiencies
about 3 times higher than they actually are.  Japanese trains often
have 3 seats on each side of the aisle which makes them more
energy-efficient, but could larger Americans fit in such seats?  This
is where Mark Twain's "damn lies and statistics" comes into play.

> From chris at chrislouden.com  Wed May 14 12:01:54 2008 From: chris
> at chrislouden.com (Chris Louden) Coasting down hill in neutral is
> not illegal, but coasting downhill with the engine off is illegal in
> California in the past someone pointed that out to David. David's
> purposed driving method involves surging to high speed then coasting
> to a lower speed with the engine off.
Not exactly: The California Vehicle Code:
Coasting Prohibited
    21710.  The driver of a motor vehicle when traveling on down grade upon
    any highway shall not coast with the gears of such vehicle in neutral.

About 25 years ago I tried to get this law changed, based on the need
to save fuel.  No success.  But with the situation today, it may
actually get changed.
  
> From: dank at kegel.com (Dan Kegel)
> Date: Wed May 14 12:13:04 2008
> Yes, it's a bandaid.  To really fix things, we have to convert to
> 100% solar power, or something like that, I'm afraid.  See   "A
> Solar Grand Plan"; January 2008; Scientific American Magazine
Solar may not save energy.  See my response to next post.

> From: x at xman.org (Christopher Smith)
> Date: Wed May 14 13:43:16 2008
> That said, oil production levels aren't growing too quickly these days, 
> so energy conservation measures (particularly significant ones, like 
> driving less and/or driving more fuel efficient vehicles) really are the 
> most effective way for us to alter the supply/demand situation in the 
> short term. In the long term, you need some other source of energy (see:
> http://google.org/rec.html) to become more cost effective than 
> petrochemicals to really have a lasting impact.

I just don't think that there is any other source of energy that's
feasible.  I think we've underestimated the amount of embodied fuel
energy it takes to make alternative types of energy such as solar,
biofuels, etc.  For the case of solar, see
http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache:5ND_gDdBnTwJ:www.nps.edu/drmi/docs/DRMI%2520Working%2520Paper%252006-02.pdf+photo-voltaics+%22working+paper%22+navy&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us&ie=UTF-8
(WORKING PAPER SERIES 2006/02 Photo-voltaics Navy)

But there are a couple of solutions (both are direly needed).  One is
to significantly reduce US (and world) population.  The other is to
reduce consumption, such as living where you work, etc.  The company
towns in days of yore did this and companies need to provide housing
next to their plants and offices for their workers at reasonable
rents.  See http://www.lafn.org/~dave/trans/energy/travel_less.html
"Travel Less" by me.

> From x at xman.org  Wed May 14 20:00:58 2008
> From: x at xman.org (Christopher Smith)
> As the price of petrochemicals goes up, so do the options for oil and 
> gas producers. If the prices get much higher, Canada may become the 
> richest source of oil reserves in the world within a few years. Not to 
> mention that wind power starts to become a really nice alternative to 
> coal/gas/oil, reducing our need to consume it for power generation.

Wind power only is feasible due to subsidy, so it's not clear that it
actually saves energy when one counts embodied energy correctly.  See
the above link for Photo-voltaics.  I point out in my "in progress"
Human Energy Accounting that the human energy used to make things is
not being accounted for properly in embodied energy studies, as does
the Photo-voltaic article.  But my article still needs a lot of work.
It's at: http://www.lafn.org/~dave/energy/human_energy.html
			David Lawyer