Nice electricity storage solution: pump water up hill

In this Forbes article (which I still get the magazine for free) by Jonathan Fahey, he talks about the perennial problem of renewable energy sources.  The problem whether it be wind or solar is how do you store it and provide it on a regular, nearly continuous basis?

The solution in this article is to pump water 1,200 feet up when a lot of electricity is being produced and then when it is needed, the pump would become a generator that produces up to 400 megawatts.  This would require building two lakes that each could hold 1.5 billion gallons of water.

There is a 20 percent frictional loss because you spend 5 kilowatt-hours to get 4 kilowatt-hours back.

Click here to read more about this.

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We need more of this. Especially in Southern California.

Well, not the wood pellets, but the grinding up of pine trees killed by the bark beetles.

So many nice and interesting articles in the current issue of Forbes (yes, getting for free).

This one is about a guy, Mark Mathis who went into a Home Depot and found out there was a shortage of wood pellets for his stove. Because of that, he started his own pellet mill. After one year, he's already turning a profit.

The best part, is that he's making the wood pellets with wood from trees that were killed by the bark beetles. The wood is dried in furnaces that are heated by sawdust.

Future plans include turning one ton of wood into 60 gallons of ethanol and 800 pounds of wood pellets.

Click here to read more.

LATimes.com: Who needs gas if you have old beer?

Shaquille O'Neal is an investor in this concept. You pay $10k for a "Micro-Fueler" which has a 250 gallon storage tank and makes ethanol. You will need an alcohol fuel producer's permit from the United States Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau to produce up to 10,000 gallons per year, but here's how it works.

You have the device on your personal property with a pump similar to that found at gas stations. It is most effective with wastes that are high in alcohol (like "liquid waste" from brewing companies), but can also take things like "lawn clippings, dairy products, old chemicals, cardboard, paper, bruised and discarded apples." They are all fermented and turned into fuel "in minutes." If you don't have enough waste to create enough fuel, the company will deliver some raw materials at the rate of $2.00 per gallon. GreenHouse International has contracts to convert 29,000 tons of brewing company waste using these MicroFuelers.

In addition to using it to make ethanol for your car, you can use the ethanol to run a generator that produces 23 kilowatt-hours of electricity per gallon of fuel.

One thing to keep in mind is that your miles-per-gallon rating with ethanol is not the same as with gasoline (it is less), but the carbon dioxide emissions is less with ethanol.

Not sure if it is worth all the hassle (application to the government, maintaining a delivery schedule, slight drop in mileage is difficult to compare actual price and price savings, etc.) but it is an interesting concept.

For more information, read the Los Angeles Times article by clicking here.

Gary Strobel: The "Indiana Jones" of Fungus

Gary Strobel from Montana State University was featured in a Forbes article. They don't have it on their website.

He has found a fungus that can create Biodiesel in small amounts. There is still work to be done to see if there are ways to increase the volume of production, but if efficient, it would be another method of creating fuel.

Click here for his profile at Montana State University and links to some NPR features on "myco-diesel".