Reponses to: What will be the fuel of the future?

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

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siddharthkumar

Uploaded on 01/07/2008

Would it be biotechnology based, electricity based, or will it remain fossil based?

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Re: What will be the fuel of the future?

Magnity

I believe that oil shale and oil sands would be the focus in the near future, because of its economic feasibility and the abundance of oil shale in the world as a natural resource compared to sweet crude oil. Political instability in the middle east will also drive oil shale and oil sand production up.

For the far future, I suspect that we shall abandon hydrocarbons entirely. As a planet, we will not rely on one source of energy. Rather, we will build the infrastructure to generate energy from the most economical source within our political and geographical reach (geothermal, hydrogen, fusion, etc). The reason behind this conclusion is that our plant does not have the one source of energy that will satisfy our energy needs (ie. like oil at the present). Therefore, we will pool together the source of energy that we can gather to meet those needs.

This outlook of the future will create a new energy market, assuming by that point in time an economical solution for energy storage will be developed. As some groups will be able to generate energy cheaper than other, arbitrage opportunities arises.

THE MAG

Re: What will be the fuel of the future?

greenx

There will not be one fuel of the future. Our transportation and energy needs will be supplied from a diversified portfolio of sources.

Examples of future "fuels" (energy storage mediums):

electricity
biodiesel (derived from algae)
compressed air
hydrogen
human power! (bike and walk)
wind (for over seas shipping)

We capable of greatly reducing our fuel requirements by designing our cities and communities around public transit, walking, and biking. There is not enough discussion about ways to reduce our fuel needs!

Re: What will be the fuel of the future?

Whitman Moore

Nano-generated electricity and/or a newer form of energy evolved from bio-nano technology, though more lasting and easier to generate.

Example: Recently nano-generated power has been evolved in the form of nano-strands (thinner than a human hair) which generate power via the friction of being rubbed together. In clothing uses this reaction can generate enough power to operate night-vision goggles for soldiers or the like. The only hold back is this type of clothing can not be laundered/cleaned in a conventional manner. A next step would be use the same technology to provide automatic expulsion of dirt and debris from said clothing providing on going cleanliness.

Re: What will be the fuel of the future?

Mikis

Electricity Will be the fuel of the future.

Or at least thats how it looks now. Electric cars have been the only type to succeed in the least. Even though hybrids still rely on fossil fuel, people have accepted the electrical components with open arms. This is half the battle I feel. To convince people that a fuel is better than straight fossil. Then we look at full electric cars like the Telsa Roadster. Cars like this not only show us that electric cars are possible, but that they can be exciting.

The only other fuel that comes close is hydrogen. And hydrogen works great, but we go back to the problem of storage, transportation and creation. You can create hydrogen from natural gas, which releases CO2. Or use electricity to split it from water. This takes an incredible amount of electricity and go back to the problem of were we get the electricity comes from. If thats not bad enough, hydrogen is very hard to compress meaning its hard to put in a tank to transport or fuel in a car. This also means its dangerous.

Electric cars are much more advanced and safe. The only problem I see is clean generation of electricity and the actual storage of it in the car. While both of these can already be done, it can be done better. All we need is a good battery breakthrough and we're there. Imagine fueling stations with wind and solar power on site. Nothing would need to come stock it. Totally clean. And if we have better batteries to put into cars, it can be lighter, less expensive and break that 200 mile range issue. That is my dream.

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