CaptainPanic

Bio-ethanol in combination with bio-gas is the best, because you also utilize the waste. I'm sure many US corn ethanol producers are either considering bio-gas or already producing it. Or perhaps they make animal feed from the residues. The cellulose feedstock for cellulosic ethanol is much cheaper. The existing bottlenecks are the pretreatment and enzyme costs: Often the cellulose is not "available" for enzymes to break it down. In stead it is "locked" inside the plant, and protected by other polymers such as lignin. That's where the pretreatment comes in. There exist lots of ways to destroy the plant. It sounds simple, but it is tricky because: you do not want to degrade the cellulose and sugars into something useless. The second bottleneck is the price of enzymes. But these are getting cheaper all the time, and at some point this should not be a problem any more. The main issue with any biofuels, and also solar and wind (and any form of energy that is not stored under ground) is that it needs SPACE. Something is there already, and it must move because we want solar panels, or a wind turbine, or corn fields. And bio fuels need the most space of them all.

The production of 1 mole of CO2 gives you 393.5 kJ/mol of energy. 1 mole weighs 44.01 g/mol. The production of 1 kg of CO2 therefore gives you 8.9 MJ/kg of energy. Now lets see how high you can get something with this energy. I'll assume a constant gravitational acceleration if you don't mind: 9.81 m/s2. E = m*g*h h = E/(m*g) = 8.9E6/(1*9.81) = 907,000 m. That's 907 km. That's in orbit, not completely gone. Also, the CO2 will only have altitude, but to remain in orbit it also needs speed. Therefore, it will simply fall back straight down again. Therefore, we can conclude that to really shoot 1 kg of CO2 into space, you will need to produce more than 1 kg of CO2 on earth. Hardly sustainable. If you want to utilize any of the energy from the combustion of carbon to CO2, you'll have to settle for shooting the produced CO2 into orbit, lower than 907 km altitude. This means: 1. Eventually the CO2 will fall back. It's not a permanent solution, it is temporary. 2. We will get a ring, just like Saturn. Ours will consist of gaseous and solid CO2, and will be found between about 400 and 900 km altitude. Perhaps it attracts alien tourists? I haven't mentioned methane, because I don't see why you'd shoot methane into space once you got it concentrated. You'd be better off selling it as "methane" or "natural gas" to consumers. They will voluntarily turn it into CO2 for you, and will even give you money for it. And if you plan on wasting sustainable (solar/wind) power on shooting CO2 into space, you'd help the earth more if you just sold the sustainable electricity (so that no CO2 is produced to do that).

I think this was pretty much an invitation to ask any question related to analytical chemistry. It surely would encourage me, not scare me away.

That sounds like a good answer and a good explanation.

I think the easiest Linux version (distribution) is Ubuntu. Check their forums to see the system requirements or anything else (use the search function, or type any problem plus the word "ubuntu" in google to get an answer. So, in short: Ubuntu is damn easy to use and install, and has a great forum for any problem. Only the fact that your pc is near-prehistoric might be a problem challenge. Have a look at this thread on the Ubuntu forum about light versions of linux: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=865469&highlight=pentium - perhaps you posted it yourself, perhaps you've never seen it. Anyway, it's certainly on topic here.

Or a biochemistry forum. Or a polymer chemistry forum. Or a chemical engineering forum. Then again, very often people who start threads (those with many questions) don't know where to put something (how often don't we see organic and inorganic chemistry mixed up?), so I think 4 chemistry threads, 6 physics subforums, an engineering subforum and a bunch of other topics are enough. Enough anyway to dazzle some of the younger members (not me).

It's not very easy to make things this cold. If you're not ready to rebuild your garage into a physics lab and spend some money, you might as well forget about it. What do you need the superconductors for?

First off, I'm not sure we have all heard of the tether into space. I have heard of ideas of the space elevator. Also, some satellites have been equipped with a tether... so it might be useful to provide some more background, or a link. Second, I'm not sure that the term "pressure" applies when you're talking about carbon nanotubes. These are typically in the order of a few nanometers (hence the name) in width. This means that only a few helium or hydrogen atoms/molecules would fit in there next to each other. The interactions of the helium/hydrogen with the nanotube are probably as frequent as with the other gas molecules... and therefore I am not sure we can even call it a gas inside. But reading your post makes me think that you want a balloon of carbon-fibre... so the gas would be several liters or even m3, in a strengthened structure. If you're in space (no oxygen present), who cares about explosive mixtures? (I mean, you're not using gaseous TNT after all... Hydrogen itself is harmless without oxygen). Are you thinking of putting something in space? Why do you need helium? So, basically, I haven't understood your question.

I agree. That would be better. But in America, it also has to make profit, and that's why it's not going to happen soon. Welcome in the capitalist world. In fact, no system will ever replace a current system. We'll either have a completely new system (in a way that roads and railroads are a different thing) or upgrade an old one (like highways and normal roads). Utopian plans which completely replace an old system but that will only be attractive once finished on a big scale don't stand a chance. p.s. I cannot open your link.

I'm not familiar with the reaction, but calcium hypochlorite [ce]Ca(ClO)2[/ce] is not the same as calcium chloride [ce]CaCl2[/ce].

Without having read the whole thread, I want to share a good idea that at least one town in the Netherlands had: There was a tunnel in the city, and the government had hired some company to "decorate" it. It got some ugly balloons in happy colors. It just looked dreadful. A place where people pass as fast as possible, and only stop to urinate will not change because you paint the odd balloon on a wall (all looked the same, and just 3 different colors, on a nice grey background). Then some genius came up with this idea: The local government put up a sigh saying: "Official graffiti place, please only use this-and-this wall". Now the most beautiful paintings decorate the tunnel's walls, and people actually stop to watch. Only downside I can find is that the air inside the tunnel isn't always healthy (paint-smell). It reduced graffiti in the rest of the city, and improved the looks of a part of it. Brilliant! The tunnel gets an almost complete new look about every month, and sometimes as many as 10 people are making some really good art there.

He has to be aggressive because of the general opinion (and lack of information) of the American public. Obama is a lot more popular overseas. His speech in Berlin was just great. One remark he made showed he understands the situation: "Many Europeans feel that America is part of the problem, rather than part of the solution." He couldn't have said it any better... This goes for climate and world peace. I also think that other parts of the world (of which I know a lot less) think he's a better chance of having talks rather than bombs. In addition, if elected, there is a fair chance that the old grandpa (McCain) dies in office. The guy is 72 years old after all. I would be terrified with a hockeymom as president. Honestly, what does she know about the world? She'd be overrun by all the advisors that have made the Bush administration such a success! What's perhaps even more remarkable is the attention in Dutch media. We can't even vote, but it might be covered as much as the Dutch elections normally are. I guess we also need change. We don't care about US healthcare or US social problems, but the foreign policy of the USA has been a complete disaster, and not many will disagree with that.

Hmm... yeah, I guessed wrong. A little wiki-study (not in the mood to go any deeper than that) shows that it's true: "In diesel engines, a mechanical injector system vaporizes the fuel into a pre-combustion chamber (as opposed to a Venturi jet in a carburetor, or a Fuel injector in a fuel injection system vaporizing fuel into the intake manifold or intake runners as in a petrol engine). " - source It does make sense that you have to adjust the oxygen / fuel mixture though. It's just done with a different piece of equipment, and not with a carb(urettor). I think I should stop posting in this thread before I burn my fingers. I know a bit about biodiesel, but sadly not too much about cars

People have spread pretty much around the globe during the last 10000 years. Most guesses about these catastrophes put the date around that time as well... Therefore I conclude that it might not be necessary that a flood actually happened everywhere. The story might have traveled with the people. Furthermore, I do agree that there is no evidence that the world as a whole flooded (or that the continents sank). Assuming that many places spread around the world suffered from floods, there is no evidence that this happened on the same days... And for the myths to survive, there is no need for that either. After all, myths are not history. Both points also go for other myths like dragons (monster stories are also pretty wide spread).

According to a Washington Post article, Google's picture storage/database is able to recognise faces... and doing that automatically for all pictures stored in its database. Did Google finally become the world's most evil company? It knows an awful lot about us already, and now it also knows what we look like. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/02/AR2008090200873.html

Carburettor modifications, meaning that the fuel/air ratio must be adjusted. Abbreviations are so cool and useful.

A voltage measuring kit (multimeter or a multitester, also known as a volt/ohm meter or VOM) is cheap, and can be bought in a lot of shops that sell electronic components. It's not expensive (though I haven't looked for one for some time, I expect they cost less than 15 euro).

Indeed. I can imagine that some manure, like horse poo, can contain some fibres that can be turned into paper... but I would suggest that you throw it on the land, plant some seeds and wait 20 years until you get some decent trees. Paper making is not purely organic. Additives are used to increase strength (or, related to that, to dissolve and remove some unwanted substances, like lignin). Also, to make paper white, you'll need some additives. I'm sure wikipedia has info about it. Can I ask: why do you want to make poo-paper? (And isn't it faster to simply clean your used toilet paper)??

I have no links, but I believe there was evidence of the black sea being a fresh water lake. Then at some point the Bosporus opened and the sea expanded by 50% in a really short time. That's the biggest flood I've heard about. I guess if you lived there in the old days, it seemed pretty much like a global flood. But evidence I have not myself. Perhaps searching about this particular event can help?

You forgot the greatest of them all: the best chemistry and science forum: http://www.scienceforums.net/forum/index.php p.s. This button can be used to create a link:

Pfft. People deliver a max. of about 400 W. Assume that passing a gate takes 1 second. Assume that 100 million people (all of Japan) pass the gate daily. That delivers 400*1*1e8 = 40 GJ of energy, or an average of 460 kW... which is nothing for a whole country's rail system. One modern electric locomotive consumes 4.5 MW (megawatt!)... so this environmentally friendly gate will provide about 10% of the power consumption of 1 locomotive (at peak power).

In a table in an old book I got since highschool it says that [ce] FeCl3.6H2O_{(s)} [/ce] is red-brown.

Why sorry to the UK guys? Is there something going on there? Or is your world no bigger than North America + UK? On topic again: we're discussing where one can get radioactive material... but we aren't discussing why one would be searching for it? I can only come up with two peaceful applications myself (I'm no nuclear expert): medical isotopes for cancer treatments (but hospitals have their sources of this stuff, they won't be asking how to obtain that on this forum) and smoke detectors (apparently someone was considering to take them apart, so that means it's not the application we're searching for either).

The ionization reaction should be: [ce] ^{3}He^{0} \rightarrow {2 electrons} + ^{3}He^{+2} [/ce]

Get an engineer.