One of the things I have been puzzling over for many a year is the relative costs associated with maintenance for steam as versus deisel locomotives, and thanks to my persistant having to think the issue through in reply to many a posting needing the replies I have given, I have finally figured out how to present the information in an easy-to-read and easy-to-grasp way.
The following post relates to it: http://www.peakoil.com/post284589.html#284589
Thanks to everyone, you have done a fine job of making my thought processes more and more refined and both digestable and able to be grasped by amateurs, a problem I had found intractable before I found these boards (forums...uh...places to post ideas?).
I owe everyone here a big thank-you for that.
Uber.
PeakOil is You
I'd like to thanks those here for helping
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I'd like to thanks those here for helping
by ubercynicmeister » Wed 12 Apr 2006, 22:17:20
.
"To Get Rich you have to:
*Get up early;
*Work Hard;
*Strike Oil"
J Paul Getty
"To Get Rich you have to:
*Get up early;
*Work Hard;
*Strike Oil"
J Paul Getty
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ubercynicmeister - Tar Sands
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Re: I'd like to thanks those here for helping
by rogerhb » Wed 12 Apr 2006, 22:31:03
Is it true that it is more sensible to run a steam engine directly from coal than to attempt run a diesel on diesel made from coal?
"Complex problems have simple, easy to understand, wrong answers." - Henry Louis Mencken
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rogerhb - Light Sweet Crude
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Re: I'd like to thanks those here for helping
by ubercynicmeister » Thu 13 Apr 2006, 20:13:28
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('rogerhb', 'I')s it true that it is more sensible to run a steam engine directly from coal than to attempt run a diesel on diesel made from coal?
It requires a whole lot less energy to run a steam locomotive directly on coal rather than running a diesel locomotive on fuel-from-coal-liquefaction/ hydrogenation.
So it depends on what you mean by sensible.
If you mean "Oh My God, we're in an awful fix and we need an urgent solution and it's panic stage" then, yeah, it's 'sensible' to build liquefaction/ hydrogenation plants and suck up almost all of the country's water supplies so a few diesels can keep going. Please remember: Australia is the driest continent on Earth, after Antarctica. We already have huge water supply problems and so diverting some more of that to convert coal-to-liquid fuel is going to be met with a storm of protest.
If you mean "Hey, we should think about this before committing ourselves to something that might come back and bite us on the bum" then coal liquefaction/ hydrogenation might not be such a good idea.
In any case the solution is to use wood-burning locomotives (ie: steam) as the Benguella Railway did. What they haul is whatever will pay, I guess.
.
"To Get Rich you have to:
*Get up early;
*Work Hard;
*Strike Oil"
J Paul Getty
"To Get Rich you have to:
*Get up early;
*Work Hard;
*Strike Oil"
J Paul Getty
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ubercynicmeister - Tar Sands
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- Joined: Sun 25 Jul 2004, 03:00:00
- Location: Hunter Valley, New South Wales, Australia
Re: I'd like to thanks those here for helping
by pedalling_faster » Thu 13 Apr 2006, 21:34:11
i rode an old fashioned coal train in colorado in about 1970. i remembered i liked the way the coal smoke smelled, of course i wasn't thinking about mercury etc. in the smoke.
it was up in some silver town that ended up being a tourist town. still nice, in the Rockies.
i think this raises the question of how to control the toxins that result from creating the energy.
it's a lot easier to control the toxins on a stationary coal burning platform, than when it's moving.
there's a loss with energy transmission but if the energy source is near the rail line this loss need not exceed 10%.
what does the town vote, spew the smoke and get a little extra energy, or expend some energy cleaning the exhaust and have an energy transmission loss ?
it was up in some silver town that ended up being a tourist town. still nice, in the Rockies.
i think this raises the question of how to control the toxins that result from creating the energy.
it's a lot easier to control the toxins on a stationary coal burning platform, than when it's moving.
there's a loss with energy transmission but if the energy source is near the rail line this loss need not exceed 10%.
what does the town vote, spew the smoke and get a little extra energy, or expend some energy cleaning the exhaust and have an energy transmission loss ?
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pedalling_faster - Permanently Banned
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Re: I'd like to thanks those here for helping
by ubercynicmeister » Thu 13 Apr 2006, 23:02:09
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pedalling_faster', 'i') rode an old fashioned coal train in colorado in about 1970. i remembered i liked the way the coal smoke smelled, of course i wasn't thinking about mercury etc. in the smoke.
LOL, it don't need to BE that way, pedalling faster.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')t was up in some silver town that ended up being a tourist town. still nice, in the Rockies.
That'll be the Silverton and Durango railway in Colorado (not sure of it's exact locale...Durango is whereabouts?)
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'i') think this raises the question of how to control the toxins that result from creating the energy.
If one uses wood to fire the locomotive (wood from plantation) there need not be any toxins. And if one uses things like compressed Municipal waste (household garbage) one can use steam classification to remove the nasties before they get fed into the fire box - and recycle the nasties, if that's what's wanted.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'i')t's a lot easier to control the toxins on a stationary coal burning platform, than when it's moving.
I haven't got time to go into it all, but the steam locomotive actually is a lot less polluting than the diesel. I'm about to go celebrate the best news in Australian rail History:Chris Corrigan to accept Toll Holdings takeover offer
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 't')here's a loss with energy transmission but if the energy source is near the rail line this loss need not exceed 10%.
what does the town vote, spew the smoke and get a little extra energy, or expend some energy cleaning the exhaust and have an energy transmission loss ?
Neither. With steam ANY fuel can be used. Bamboo, bagasse (left-over of sugar refining - if we all go for ethanol, we'll have plenty O' this!), household waste (after steam classification of the waste stream), plantation wood, whatever.
The preseved locomotives use coal to give an "authentic" smell to the exhaust. But even so, what they put out is less carcinogenic than the diesels, and it can often have less microscopic particulate matter. If you're talking about a modern steam locomotive, this is especially so, so much so that there is a serious proposal to use steam locomotives instead of diesels on the unelectrified commuter lines in Austria under the very strict European Standards.
.
"To Get Rich you have to:
*Get up early;
*Work Hard;
*Strike Oil"
J Paul Getty
"To Get Rich you have to:
*Get up early;
*Work Hard;
*Strike Oil"
J Paul Getty