Daily Archives: November 29, 2004

TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND HYDROGEN BY ELECTROLYSIS

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Lynne Kiesling

Yesterday the New York Times had an article on a new method of producing hydrogen from electrolysis using nuclear power (registration required). The new technique still is not a net production of energy, but it has drastically cut the amount of energy required to isolate the hydrogen:

The heart of the plan is an improvement on the most convenient way to make hydrogen, which is to run electric current through water, splitting the H2O molecule into hydrogen and oxygen. This process, called electrolysis, now has a drawback: if the electricity comes from coal, which is the biggest source of power in this country, then the energy value of the ingredients – the amount of energy given off when the fuel is burned – is three and a half to four times larger than the energy value of the product. Also, carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions increase when the additional coal is burned.

Hydrogen can also be made by mixing steam with natural gas and breaking apart both molecules, but the price of natural gas is rising rapidly.

The new method involves running electricity through water that has a very high temperature. As the water molecule breaks up, a ceramic sieve separates the oxygen from the hydrogen. The resulting hydrogen has about half the energy value of the energy put into the process, the developers say. Such losses may be acceptable, or even desirable, because hydrogen for a nuclear reactor can be substituted for oil, which is imported and expensive, and because the basic fuel, uranium, is plentiful.

The idea is to build a reactor that would heat the cooling medium in the nuclear core, in this case helium gas, to about 1,000 degrees Celsius, or more than 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit. The existing generation of reactors, used exclusively for electric generation, use water for cooling and heat it to only about 300 degrees Celsius.

The hot gas would be used two ways. It would spin a turbine to make electricity, which could be run through the water being separated. And it would heat that water, to 800 degrees Celsius. But if electricity demand on the power grid ran extremely high, the hydrogen production could easily be shut down for a few hours, and all of the energy could be converted to electricity, designers say.

The kicker here is, of course, building the type of nuclear reactor that would be able to serve such double duty. Perhaps if natural gas prices stay close to $7/mmBTU and oil stays above $40/barrel we’ll see the construction of new nuclear reactors.

Very interesting development.

TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND HYDROGEN BY ELECTROLYSIS

Posted on by

Lynne Kiesling

Yesterday the New York Times had an article on a new method of producing hydrogen from electrolysis using nuclear power (registration required). The new technique still is not a net production of energy, but it has drastically cut the amount of energy required to isolate the hydrogen:

The heart of the plan is an improvement on the most convenient way to make hydrogen, which is to run electric current through water, splitting the H2O molecule into hydrogen and oxygen. This process, called electrolysis, now has a drawback: if the electricity comes from coal, which is the biggest source of power in this country, then the energy value of the ingredients – the amount of energy given off when the fuel is burned – is three and a half to four times larger than the energy value of the product. Also, carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions increase when the additional coal is burned.

Hydrogen can also be made by mixing steam with natural gas and breaking apart both molecules, but the price of natural gas is rising rapidly.

The new method involves running electricity through water that has a very high temperature. As the water molecule breaks up, a ceramic sieve separates the oxygen from the hydrogen. The resulting hydrogen has about half the energy value of the energy put into the process, the developers say. Such losses may be acceptable, or even desirable, because hydrogen for a nuclear reactor can be substituted for oil, which is imported and expensive, and because the basic fuel, uranium, is plentiful.

The idea is to build a reactor that would heat the cooling medium in the nuclear core, in this case helium gas, to about 1,000 degrees Celsius, or more than 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit. The existing generation of reactors, used exclusively for electric generation, use water for cooling and heat it to only about 300 degrees Celsius.

The hot gas would be used two ways. It would spin a turbine to make electricity, which could be run through the water being separated. And it would heat that water, to 800 degrees Celsius. But if electricity demand on the power grid ran extremely high, the hydrogen production could easily be shut down for a few hours, and all of the energy could be converted to electricity, designers say.

The kicker here is, of course, building the type of nuclear reactor that would be able to serve such double duty. Perhaps if natural gas prices stay close to $7/mmBTU and oil stays above $40/barrel we’ll see the construction of new nuclear reactors.

Very interesting development.

SHOPPING, STYLE, AND SNOBBERY: WE’RE LUCKY

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Lynne Kiesling

In catching up on the mail and newspaper yesterday after returning home, I was excited to read Virginia Postrel’s Wall Street Journal Weekend section column on shopping and fashion magazines (subscription required). Virginia sees an independence and creativity in the emergence and popularity of shopping magazines relative to old fashion stalwarts like Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar:

Shopping magazines don’t dilute their celebration of shoes, gadgets, sweaters, handbags and makeup with articles on politics, celebrities or art. That makes it easy to sneer at them. Critics call these publications “magalogs,” charging that they’re little more than catalogs. Lucky doesn’t even have real articles, grouse prestige journalists, just glorified captions. Even Kim France, Lucky’s editor in chief, acknowledges that the magazine’s photography is “very literal,” with none of the artistic ambition of Fashion photography with a capital F.

For all their blatant materialism, however, Lucky and its kin actually represent cultural progress. Their unabashed presentation of goods as material pleasures keeps materialism in its place. They don’t encourage readers to equate fashion with virtue or style with superiority. They’re sharing fun, not rationing status.

That last point is the most important of all: the realization of the idea that shopping as a process is itself fun, and that the process of creating your own look instead of aspiring to what the magazines tell you that you should want to buy is fun and empowering. And these shopping magazines are much less elitist and less hierarchical than the old guard fashion magazines.

The shopping magazines reverse the relationship between reader and editor. In traditional publications, the reader’s goal is to emulate the editor’s style, to admire the people she admires, to read the books she reads, to wear the things she wears. Thus every issue of Vogue has a section called “People Are Talking About,” to let you know what books, movies, art exhibits, restaurants and so forth the in-crowd deems essential. Traditional fashion magazines tell readers not just what to buy but what to value. [emphasis added -- LK]

But in the shopping magazines, the editor represents the reader, serving not as arbiter but as agent. Lucky effectively uses photos of its various editors, and their first-person voices, to emphasize personal style and individual passions. Instead of dos and don’ts, ins and outs, it offers “What I want NOW” and “Our Obsessions.” Editors come across as fellow enthusiasts. They know more than their readers not because they’re superior creatures but because they get paid to look for really great stuff.

This is great because it makes finding a great piece, a great bargain, a great pair of shoes that are also affordable and comfortable, a collaborative and congenial activity. There’s a sense of empathy, of “we’re in this together” between reader and editor because each one knows how wonderful it feels to find that perfect pair of pants that makes you feel like you’re queen of the universe. The old guard fashion magazine continues to be about aspiration, about status difference between the subjects of the features (and, by extension, the editors) and the readers themselves. There’s no empathy, no sense of conspiratorial glee in finding that you can put together your expensive Marc Jacobs jeans with a very cool $12 Old Navy top and create a really cool look, for example. And that these looks are individual.

It turns the aspiration from one of status by emulating the rich and famous to one of aspiring to apply your own creativity and enjoy the process of putting it all together, and feeling great about how you look and how you achieved it when all is said and done.

[Side note: this is also a big reason why I knit. Original pieces, personally tailored]

In fact, I subscribed to Vogue for years, but I cancelled it when I realized that I didn’t give a hoot about what “People Are Talking About” and the only features I was reading were Jeffrey Steingarten’s food and cooking articles (which are fabulous). I find that when I buy a fashion magazine these days it’s likely to be In Style, Lucky, or Allure. Virginia’s column on Friday articulated to me why my behavior has shifted.

UPDATE: Virginia’s posted the Opinionjournal.com link, so even non-subscribers can read it, yay.