Zero Emission Vehicles, INTELLIGENT SOLUTIONS FOR ALL

Okay here is a simple idea we have not yet bothered to implement for unknown reasons.

How feasible or unfeasable would it be I wonder to SIMPLY feed the environmentally harmful, climate changing, and lung damaging automobile exhausts through a small COMPRESSOR and STORE IT in a TANK for later reprocessing by recycling stations.

Has this been done or tried before? I think this would be less expensive for those who choose to value that.

Yes indeed. If some fiat value was placed on exhausts of all sorts, they would definitely become commodities, keeping in mind it might encourage some to deliberately produce more exhaust, which might turn out to be a cash crop for the petrochemical industry. A vicious cycle it is until we eliminate harmful smog causing emmisions. Acid rain means acid oceans which lead to the death of the corals and the fishes in the oceans which all life depends on. Since it has long been one of the major problems facing humankind, one would think todays generations would be more than ready for such an initiative. We definitely need to get a grip on air pollution by eliminating harmful and damaging emissions.

POLLUTION IS NOT COOL



This post has been edited by PJParent001 on Nov 11 2007, 04:46 PM

PJParent001,
Your idea sounds simple enough alright but,,,
An engine requires a good air flow through it's combustion chamber to work. It would be like asking you to only exhale into a balloon. Yes you could do that for the most part but now add to this requiring you to run a 4 minute mile. As the tank that you wish to put the exhaust gas into becomes pressurized the engine would slow down until a point when the air pressure in the tank is equal to the outside air pressure at this point all work of the engine would stop. If you had enough pressure on your lungs so as to keep them from taking in new air you would also stop.

> POLLUTION IS NOT COOL... you said it, this is why I am such a big fan of the electric car. charge it with PV cells or wind and we would have allot cleaner air. There are many advantages to an electric car. I can't wait for the new Chevy Volt. In the meanwhile I have for the past 2 years been building my own electric car. From scratch, not a conversion. By the time I get it ready for the batteries perhaps they will be cheaper.

This post has been edited by paul h on Nov 11 2007, 08:14 PM

As nano technology gets better i would expect much better battery capacity. Somewhere here i read about a new nanotecnology imbedding nano 'coaltubes' in the battery giving it up to a thirty percent longer 'lifecycle' of unbroken electricity deliverance. That's cool :)

Thanks Paul. The exhaust after passing the catalytic converter could be turbocharged (extreme variable vacuum) and blown either through a oneway valve or another compressor and into the tank. I understand hot exhaust gases power turbos extremely well. The tank could be emptied at either the filling station or a recycling station.

So we have exhaust from the converter into the turbo then past the oneway valve into the tank. Then the converter could perhaps be removed and save signifcant cost. The idea might only be feasible for driving around town, but just that, I believe would be a major improvement. Can you imagine smog free skies? Breathing clean fresh air everyday? I think recent events show the world is moving towards closing the hydrocarbon cycle. Trap. Store. Reprocess. Collectively and globally we can choose greener manufacturing of greener products.

I'd be willing to tow a trailer behind my car in order to trap exhaust gases if need be as it would at least demonstrate proof of concept as well as trap emissions.

I think the reason it isn't being done is it might seem a bit silly, but when I consider the ramifications, it makes me wonder why it isn't being done. Of course this idea isn't knew since I recall thinking about such an approach in my early teens.

I think electric cars are great too. Batteries will become better and cheaper and I have learned recently one can addon supercapacitors.

When a vehicle starts braking, heat from the brakes could be transformed into electricity to charge up the batteries. The crap flying off of the brakes should not be allowed into the environment either. Also when a vehicle coasts down a hill, the amount of energy being wasted is relatively enormous!

I've done some reading and it still seems solar and wind are a good way to go. It would be nice if we could all afford to install solar panels.

Best of luck on your electric car. I would buy one if I could afford it.

Keep it green!

This post has been edited by PJParent001 on Nov 12 2007, 06:39 AM

Definitely an improvement and superexcellent for some apps. I should be in the carbon nanotube biz! I think the new recharchable ''nickel metal hydride batteries'' (NiMH) are superexcellent for energy storage. Amazing stuff. You can check it out: ovonics.com The man who figured it out is brilliant. His manufacturing plant pumps out flexible thinfilm solar panels that are over a mile long! It's wild. When they pump H2 into a tank containing NiMH for storage, they get superexcellent storage capacity, plus HEAT! AMAZING!

Why don't you just use fuel that when combusted does not cause any emissions ??

Just need to widen your thinking.... A LOT

>> this is why I am such a big fan of the electric car. charge it with PV cells or wind and we would have allot cleaner air. >>>

well not really practical, IMO

Wind, PV cells etc are low energy and this world needs high energy on demand... now!

The concept of a liquid fuel was/is a really good idea.

Batteries need to be disposed of...

Electricity is good, but the current generation methods are very polluting

Expand your thinking
there are much better methods

This post has been edited by Zarkov on Nov 12 2007, 10:24 AM

PJParent001,
The waste tank would be the size of a semi trailer to keep from pressurizing to the point that the engine wouldn't work. The extra fuel used to pull the tank around would cause more waste than it could trap. A compressor large enough to pump that much air ( ~ 600 - 800 CFM) would take all of the power from the engine. and I do mean ALL. You can't power a turbo with exhaust to pump the exhaust gas that would be like using a motor to power a generator (in a loop). Any device that could turn break heat into electricity would weigh more than the electricity that it would produce. However, an electric car can do that just by taking your foot off of the go peddle, by turning the motor into a generator while you slow down.

Zarkov,
>Why don't you just use fuel that when combusted does not cause any emissions ??

Because IF there were such a thing it would cost too much.

>well not really practical, IMO Wind, PV cells etc are low energy....

Well I didn't mean that you should haul them around with you. I am a big fan of plug in recharging. Fuel cells generate the electricity on the fly from H but I don't think that we can generate point of use electricity cheaper than a power company can. and with lighter batteries the weight of a H tank and fuel cell compared to batteries would be a wash. (lbs for lbs) The wind generators in use now are usually 3 - 5 megawatts. 3 of those would power the average Caribbean island nation. The island nation of St. Kitts use between 9 and 12 megawatts now (but they would love to have 20) OK thats 4 wind generators and there is always wind there. Wind gererators are by no means "low energy"

>Batteries need to be disposed of...

Batteries are one of the most recycled product on the market. over 95% of a battery is recycled, and the rest is disposed of properly.

>Electricity is good, but the current generation methods are very polluting

Do you mean the current methods like wind, hydro, PV nuclear or do you think that we still use heavy diesel oil like they do in Guatemala. We just need more power plants to drive the price down.

>Expand your thinking... there are much better methods

I don't mean to sound harsh but,
We have some of the worlds best and brightest minds working on this and they are making GREAT progress. look at electricity production from coal. How clean it it now compared to 50 years ago. But what we don't need is the likes of the Serra club suing the power companies because a bird flew into the blades.

Or, we could ride cows. That way, everyone could pay a carbon offset to the oil companies and the status would remain quo.

edit: I am bitchy about this, and don't often participate in 'Green' threads. 'Nuff said.


This post has been edited by Sapo on Nov 12 2007, 11:40 PM

I like the concept of growing algae to produce H2. The little critters reproduce every 5 hours! They eat sulphur to produce O2! If you starve them they create H2 for 3 days before croaking so you feed them some sulphur to get them going again. A highly efficient and climate friendly alga culture system would most likely produce vast quantities of H2.



This post has been edited by PJParent001 on Nov 13 2007, 12:09 AM

Sapo,
>I am bitchy about this, and don't often participate in 'Green' threads. 'Nuff said.

I understand,,, Take a deep breath, count to ten, have a beer, don't get all worked up. Tell you what, I'll do my best to stave off these easy ones. You and the others can come to my rescue when I call for help if I get in over my head with the math.

re You can't power a turbo with exhaust to pump the exhaust
Ok I haven't quite figured that one out yet but it seems there's got to be a way.


This post has been edited by PJParent001 on Nov 13 2007, 12:16 AM

Thanks, bra'.

A turbo compressor uses the exhaust gas flow to turn a small turbine wheel that sucks in fresh air from another pipe and pushes it down the engine's intake. There are 2 separate air flows going on there. one intake pipe for fresh air and one for exaust air. turning the turbine does not take much power from the engine. Because the exhaust air can still flow out with ease. If however you pipe the exhaust into a tank that will cause a restriction as the tank pressurizes. Or another way to look at it is like this: the engine makes about 600 CFM of air flow , in one end and out the other, (flow through) if the air can't get out , new air won't go in. You can't pipe part of it to turn the turbine so that it can pressurize the other part. That would be perpetual motion. If the turbine created let's say 3 psi of pressure to fill the waste tank. as soon as the tank reaches 3 psi then the whole thing stops. (both sides are equal now, no flow).

Sapo,

uhh, that's brO, not bra,,,,
but we're still cool.

PJParent001,
Something for you to think about. Take your idea and put it on the other end, it would work. If you carry a large tank of air and pump it down the intake,, then the exhaust could be stored in another tank until the 2 tanks get close to equal. BUT,, the cost would be so high that I promise you we would all rather be riding Sapo's cow because those tanks would be very large.


Tanks allot
Paul