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Herr Haber
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Quote: Originally posted by Dr.Bob  |
If we can ever find ways to extract elements from the ocean effciently, we will be in great shape, as has a huge amount of gold, uranium, and many
other elements in the ocean, so it would be a great source. They are already looking at that for lithium and some other limited source metals.
Already used for salt/chlorine, Mg, Ca, Iodine, Bromine (Dead Sea), Lithium (Salton Sea), and some others.
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The real Fritz Haber did try to extract gold from sea water to help Germany pay war reparations after WW1. It didnt work as expected.
A century has passed though so I guess it will be more interesting to do now.
| Quote: Originally posted by Dr.Bob |
The Ukraine situation may alter the prices of Pt and Pd, as well as the use of electric cars, which don't need catalytic but do require many other
metals. |
That's not entirely true. The "electric revolution" will also use fuel cells that do need Pt and Pd in addition to all the batteries that as you say
do require other metals.
In this regard the decades to come promise to be very interesting as there are a lot of competing technologies.
[Edited on 1-4-2022 by Herr Haber]
The spirit of adventure was upon me. Having nitric acid and copper, I had only to learn what the words 'act upon' meant. - Ira Remsen
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Metallophile
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| Quote: Originally posted by Herr Haber |
That's not entirely true. The "electric revolution" will also use fuel cells that do need Pt and Pd in addition to all the batteries that as you say
do require other metals.
In this regard the decades to come promise to be very interesting as there are a lot of competing technologies.
[Edited on 1-4-2022 by Herr Haber] |
In my opinion the electric revolution is already happening, and fuel cells are not a part of it.
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Herr Haber
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I dont know... There are so many people with so many projects that seem very confident.
I count hydrogen as a part of the electric revolution and you can find PGM's all the way from electrolysis to the catalytic oxidation of the produced
hydrogen in a form or another.
Some people are working on systems that use hydrides in paste form in canisters. It makes no sense to me as I imagine that the cost of producing said
hydride is huge but hey, I'm not a specialist and some (I assume) smart people decide to fund this kind of research so who am I to judge ?
It certainly seems that we are at a threshold though. A bit like 120 years ago when acetylene was trying to take coal gas place while at the same time
electricity was more and more common for city lights.
The spirit of adventure was upon me. Having nitric acid and copper, I had only to learn what the words 'act upon' meant. - Ira Remsen
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Rainwater
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Once we figure it out it will be all to easy. Just like medicine. The first pill can cost billions. Everyone after that is almost free
"You can't do that" - challenge accepted
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zed
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Easy enough to make those fancy heavy elements. Just bang a couple of Neutron Stars together, and collect the material ejected by the explosion. The
super dense Neutronium, upon being released from the terrible gravitational pressures inside the Neutron stars, rearranges itself into ordinary
matter, yielding a decent proportion of very heavy elements. Gold, Platinum, Plutonium... Etc.
Since we don't yet have the interstellar flight, required to mine that enriched detritus, and we haven't figured out how to duplicate that
Neutronium process in the lab, we will just have to scrape along, for a while.
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clearly_not_atara
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Fuel cells are very interesting for the highest-end high-performance applications. Direct borohydride fuel cells, for example, have been under
development for submarines. This makes sense, because a submarine tends to cost tens of millions of dollars anyway.
For cheaper applications the range advantage of a fuel cell relative to the operating cost doesn't make sense when you can just add a few more
refueling (charging) stops. Transoceanic flight is the one major exception for obvious reasons.
Mo, Ru and Pd are accessible in asteroids, but we won't mine them before I'm retired at the earliest.
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Tsjerk
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I'm really wondering whether aviation will ever be done with electricity from batteries. Synthetic fuel seems more plausible to me.
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Dr.Bob
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Batteries are too heavy, they just need a really long, light weight, extension cord instead.
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Tsjerk
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Yes, and then fly in circles.
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Fleaker
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It will be H2 storage from renewables (Ir catalyst) put into the ammonia molecule.
It will be ammonia cracked back to hydrogen and nitrogen to run a fuel cell (Ru catalyst).
It will be platinum in the fuel cell.
This is the gist of what I heard at this year's international precious metals conference.
From my understanding, US electric grid cannot support a fully electric vehicle fleet. It will be a hybrid technology of "gas stations" with ammonia.
Neither flask nor beaker.
"Kid, you don't even know just what you don't know. "
--The Dark Lord Sauron
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draculic acid69
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| Quote: Originally posted by Rainwater | | Once we figure it out it will be all to easy. Just like medicine. The first pill can cost billions. Everyone after that is almost free
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Unless you are in the u.s. where medication can cost more than one can pay
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justender
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Yes.
NASA X-57 Maxwell, for one. There's allegedly a pile more, but this one I feel confident isn't a scam, cheating, or marketing sleight-of-hand.
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EF2000
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Sorry to bring bad news, but X-57 Maxwell was cancelled without flying (or even before being fully built to configuration IV) in June last year. See,
for example: NASA Axes X-57 Maxwell Before First Flight - AVweb.
Well, it fared a bit better than X-33, it was at least built. I hope that the airframe will not end up in the same scrapyard as X-34 (shock content warning).
Wroom wroom
"The practice of pouring yourself alcohol from a rocket fuel tank is to be strongly condemned encouraged"
-R-1 User's Guide
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