{"id":606,"date":"2011-05-30T16:16:46","date_gmt":"2011-05-30T15:16:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/?p=606"},"modified":"2011-05-30T16:16:46","modified_gmt":"2011-05-30T15:16:46","slug":"wind-energy-the-2nd-law-evs-jim-bullis-david-mackay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/2011\/05\/30\/wind-energy-the-2nd-law-evs-jim-bullis-david-mackay\/","title":{"rendered":"Wind Energy, the 2nd Law, EVs, Jim Bullis, David MacKay, ..."},"content":{"rendered":"

Catching up this morning with the Economist's bloggers, I read a Babbage<\/a> column on wind energy and the Californian dream. \u00a0As with many other science and technology blogs that I read, the interest comes as much from the discussion as it does with the originating column. \u00a0This was a case in point where a couple of contributors had a lively interchange about [i] the 2nd law of thermodynamics and the extent to which it applies to wind energy \/ power given that these do not derive from heat energy (with inevitable commensurate losses), and [ii] the extent to which electric vehicles [EV] can be said to be efficient. \u00a0It seems (see below) that the USA has followed the EU is deciding not to think about the source of the electricity when considering EV efficiency. \u00a0This has the advantage that EVs are portrayed as super-efficient compared to almost every other kind of road transport; its disadvantage is that the laws of physics have either been ignored, suspended or repealed in the process. \u00a0It also means that, in the short-term at least, EVs are more justifiable in carbon terms in a country like France (all that nuclear) or Norway (all that hydro), compared to the UK and Germany (all that oil \/ gas \/ coal \u2013 and CO2). \u00a0Do you suppose that this will be reflected in advertising for electric cars?\u00a0\u00a0Neither do I.<\/p>\n

The most interesting contributions to the column came from No Mist<\/em><\/strong> and Jim Bullis<\/a> <\/em>(who, like Babbage, writes from the USA)<\/span><\/strong>. \u00a0Jim is no stranger to the Economist's blogs, as this link<\/a> to a recent discussion shows. \u00a0Here, there is an interchange with Cambridge's David MacKay (whose book<\/a> Sustainable Energy without the hot air<\/em> I have already commented on), around the efficiency of EVs \u2013 which is also a feature of the Babbage column.<\/p>\n

This is a far from arcane dispute about the rate at which electricical and thermal energies equilibrate. \u00a0 Jim Bullis:<\/p>\n

Look at the fueleconomy.gov site<\/a> and go to the electric vehicle tab. You will eventually discover that a gallon of gasoline represents 33.7 kWhr of electric energy. \u00a0A gallon of gasoline has never produced more than about 11 kWhr of electric energy. Not in the USA or the UK at least, due to that nasty old Lord Kelvin and his stupid law. \u00a0Under Kelvin's crusty opinion, the only equivalence is the amount of heat that can be produced by these two forms of energy. Seriously, MPGe as thus defined by our EPA<\/a> is an outrageous lie. And it will trick people into buying electric vehicles that have no special merit in limiting CO2.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Of David MacKay's book, Bullis adds: \"Other than the flawed promotion of the electric vehicle, this is a well written and useful book\u201d. \u00a0 In many ways, I think it a masterly book (which I have just finished). \u00a0I found it especially clearly written but missed this equivalence point.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Catching up this morning with the Economist's bloggers, I read a Babbage column on wind energy and the Californian dream. \u00a0As with many other science and technology blogs that I read, the interest comes as much from the discussion as...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":237,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-606","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comment"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/237"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=606"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=606"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=606"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=606"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}