The Tidal Irrigation and Electrical System

There isn’t going to be a single fix to the problem of our race’s need for more energy. It is inevitable that the vast majority of the world will technologically develop and adopt a western style of consumption and energy use – and our population is still rising. Energy efficiencies and new sources of energy […]

Harvesting kelp for biofuels has a huge potential. It can be grown pretty much anyplace where the holdfast at its base can gain an anchor within reach of light and as long as the nutrients that it requires are available for growth. This happens in two kinds of places: the frigid waters of the high […]

Even though this technology may seem to be in competition with the Tidal Irrigation and Electrical System it actually isn’t, and in any case it is wonderfully exciting. Sun Catalytix has developed a cobalt and phosphate coated silicon sheet that is immersed in water. When exposed to sunlight the water is catalyzed into its component […]

The growth of homogenic carbon dioxide in the atmosphere since the industrial revolution has convinced the majority of the scientific community that the earth is poised to begin an ever increasing warming trend. It has terrified the most influential scientists and lead to the advanced study of geoengineering schemes. At the cost of billions, if […]

A team based at the University of Massachusetts Amherst has developed a novel way of turning biomass like grass cuttings, kelp or even wood pulp into the basic components of plastics and resins. This yearly $US400 billion industry is currently being supplied by the refining of fossil crude oil. According to the US Department of […]

Microbes for biofuels need carbon dioxide, sunlight, water, space to grow in and fertilizers. The last of these can come from several different places. People can make fertilizer with heavy industry out of fossil fuels or they can collect animal waste or they can collect their own waste or they can pump water from deep […]

The Tidal Irrigation and Electrical System can be considered a giant open pond for the growth of marine plants which can then be turned into biodiesel. The potential growth rates of aquatic plants far outstrip terrestrial plants. The question has been what is the best method to grow the plants so they can be converted […]

A rather nice idea was proposed by Texas based, LiveFuels, Inc. Well, it has the potential to be a nice idea. It could be absolutely horrible. They intend to create optimum algae growth in a a 45 acre saltwater pond on the Texas coast by introducing agricultural waste. Fish would be introduced into the ponds […]

The Royal Society’s report on geoengineering schemes was a disappointment. In it’s analysis of different ideas to mitigate greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere it focused on only part of the problem. Right at the beginning of the report it says that it will focus on schemes that divert solar energy into space or absorb CO2 […]

Recently, I submitted the TIE System for assessment by the Royal Society’s working group on geoengineering schemes to mitigate climate change. (http://royalsociety.org/news.asp?id=8085) In the process I have been looking at a few other ideas. Many of them, like increasing the albedo of marine stratocumulus clouds and shading the earth with a large group of small […]