The Age from Melbourne, Victoria, Australia • Page 55

THE AGE, Tuesday, November 13, 1979 515 3 ENERGY 2000C SUNLIGHT falling on one square mile of ocean could produce sufficient energy and other products to support 300 people at today's United States consumption, or more than 1000 people at world average consumption. These figures were given to Australian scientists at a recent chemical engineering conference at Surfers Paradise. The speaker, Emeritus Professor V. J. Chapman of-the University of Auckland, said that ocean energy farming could produce enough methane gas to offset the demise of oil as the basic energy fuel.

The quest for energy has highlighted the abundance of resources available to mankind, given time for development. The time factor has narrowed the field to a handful of. serious Attention is being paid to oil-bearing shale deposits in Queensland, among' the richest and most easily recoverable in the world, as a replacement for crude oil. Oil shale is not new to Australia. A pilot industry anol produced from natural gas is a more attractive alternative.

1 -Ethanol is the product of fermentation. Intensive farming would be required to produce sufficient feedstock to support ethanol production in Australia. The greatest potentiator ethanol exists in countries totally reliant on imported oil such as New Zealand and Brazil where significant progress has been made in converting to an agro-alcohol fuel economy. On a global scale, hydrogen offers the most likely long-term solution. Generated electrolyiicHy using the abundant eleetnc power from nuclear general tion, hydrogen stored in the form of metal hydrides will be the power source fofit ture vehicles.

Alan Lloyd it managlijg tditor, 'Energy Resource and Technology', Journatjtif the Australian Instituted of Energy. tial benefits for transport. They can be used in internal combustion engines either themselves or mixed with petrol. Petrol mixed with up to 15 per cent alcohol can be used in existing engines. A big advantage of blended fuel is reduced pollution.

The high-octane level of alcohol reduces the need for lead additives in premium-grade petrol. Total replacement alcohol fuel, means substantial engine and vehicle modifications. Methanol has high-octane number compared with petrol, requiring higher compression -ratios of around 13 to 1 for efficient running, compared with around 9 to 1 for engines designed for premium-grade petrol. Methanol can be made from organic wastes. However, studies indicate that the net yield of usable energy is relatively low.

Meth was established late last century in the Blue Mountains. Recovery of oil for re-finery feedstock is relatively simple, requiring heating to temperatures from 450 deg-550 deg C. The shale deposits in Queensland are thought to contain up to 10,000 years' supply of liquid crudes at today's rate of consumption. Work is expected to start on developing the Gladstone shale deposits next year. About $300 million will be required to set up the operation; using and bucket-wheel reclaimers, -to produce.

20,000 barrels a day by 1982. Estimated mining costs of $.14 a barrel and- pre-re finery processing costs of between $2 and $4 a barrel, will make shale oil an attractive alternative to natural crude. Oil refinery operators do not expect serious problems substituting shale oil for normal crude. However, it is expected that the yield per tonne of petroleum fuel will be considerably less than from Bass Strait crude. Solar boilers on a scale large enough to replace conventional nuclear and coal-fired boilers are not feasible, requiring several hundred square kilometres of collection surface to produce sufficient high-quality steam to drive one 600 megawatt turbine.

Research into more esoteric applications of solar energy such as hydrogen generation directly from water by a catalytic process, now under study by the CSIRO, is likely to have a greater impact on long-term energy options than low-value solar applications. Alcohol fuels, methanol and ethanol, offer substan Meet tihe Imxofv car An artist's drawing of a 29-hectare solar power plant being built in California. (See report page 3). Economics put solar power in the shade technology Australia to get By ANTHONY CLARKE alcohol fuel from grain. It is planned to build pilot plant in Sydney to pro- duce 2.5 million litres of ethanol a year, using a recently developed contin uous fermentation process.

It is hoped to put bacteria into the fermentation pro cess to accelerate it from 24-hour to a six-hour cycle, But this is unspectacular in overall energy terms. The use of collected solar energy in Australia is insignificant, less than one per cent- of total energy consumption, with the only ap-plication having real success being household hot water and heated water for swimming pools. Photovoltaic cells, for direct conversion, of" solar energy to electricity, are in Australia where special factors such as remote-" ness from normal power facilities overweigh the high cost. This is the first indication by a big oil company that it believes there is a place for ethanol as a petrol exten der; Queensland canegrowers Pr 16 MONTHS the town' of White Cliffs in the far west of NSW will turn on its lights and become the world's first. town powered by solar energy.

White Cliffs has only 45 residents, and a Tfoatihg population of about 300' miners. It has 13 tibuses, a school, hospital Tshd- Hotel. power now comes from several small diesel generators, fired by fuel hauled across hundreds of kilometres. Power will soon come from an ambitious solar ihermal power unit being built for the NSW Government by the Australian National University. The unit, with 14 pairs of solar- "collectors supplying super-heated steam to a steam engine, will drive an alternator with a 25 kilowatt output The- NSW Premier, Mr.

Wran, said the prototype solar installation would be the world's first high temperature, high concentration solar power station. "'But this type of development is not likely to usher in a new era of infinitely renewable power for Australian-cities. It will, for the are' evaluating the In tegration of sugar and alcohol production, and have been given a Federal grant 1 ror wis siuay. Even if a suitable eco nomic plant-to-ethanol system was developed, the agricultural effort needed to produce enough raw ma terial to make an appreciable dent in our liquid fuel They are used in remote areas to power communica-' tion equipment where only a small wattage is required as in the recent Telecom Tennant Creek solar-powered microwave link. CSIRO staff I spoke to stressed that Australia's need for direct electric power from solar energy is not critical because our electricity supply is already based on a cheap, abundant fuel source brown coal in Victoria, black coal elsewhere.

As a result the CSIRO looks at research programmes, recognising that Australia's energy problems are unique. needs would be daunting. The economics are differ ent in countries like South Africa which make exten sive use of ethanol. Because of our abundant coal, Australia's solar-ener gy research is being consciously held down for the most part, to domestic and industrial applications using established collection tech niques. foreseeable future, remain a a applicable only where geographic factors make the high capital costs a secondary consideration.

It will in fact take a concerted effort by Government, industry and the community if solar energy is. -to play any significant part in our energy future this century. The Senate Standing Committee on Natural Re- sources, in a recent report on solar energy, said low- grade heat applications for domestic and small-scale in dustrial use are now avail Japan, for instance, has mounted its expensive solar- power effort because it wants to reduce its dependence on imported crude oil for electricity generation. We have no such urgent need. I asked if we might see a cheap photovoltaic system for the home.

The experts pessimistic. The outlook was remote, they said. The experts say that because battery storage development is running behind development of photovoltaic generation systems, a domestic photovoltaic system would have to be run in conjunction with the existing electricity grid to provide power when the solar supply was not adequate. able. Such applications are based on pioneering work by the CSIRO, begun in the 1950s.

It says the next likely de velopment is expansion of This is the feeling that pervades discussion on solar energy with the key people involved in its research and application at the CSIRO division of mechanical engineering at Highetf. feeling is reinforced by a look at what is spent on solar research in Australia. Spending in 1976-77 the last year for which figures have been collated was only $3.08 million. The Federal Government's share of this was $1.6 million. The Federal figure rose for 1978-79 to $2.5 million but figures from State, private and tertiary organisations for the latest year have not yet been collated.

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Laminated windscreen, tinted glass Remote controls for headlight and external mirror adjustments Fully independent long-travel suspension Front wheel drive Optional extras: electronically controlled auto transmission, fully integrated air conditioning, alloy wheels, cloth seats. The car of the '80s now Naturallv it is front wheel drive F.vaw cars new have to economise on fuel. Renault has known this for years and now we have produced a hixury car that gives you 8.9 km1 (25. 1 mpg) without sacrificing space or first luxury car Sumptuous, fully reclining contoured seats. Power steering.

Power boosted front disc brakes Power front windows Intermittent winer control this technology to include space heating and -cooling and refrigeration, as well as the collection of heat to produce steam. The CSIRO is already switching its research emphasis to. this area. It has been working now for more than a year on a project to develop flat-plate collectors to provide energy at temperatures to about 150 Celsius high enough to satisfy many industrial needs in Australia. The Senate Committee summed up the general scientific view of solar energy when it reported to the Government that solar energy would not make any significant contribution to Australia's energy needs before the end of the century.

That is the Australian solar energy research policy: concentrate on the relatively inexpensive, proven areas of research; leave the high-cost theoretical research to those" countries in far more immediate need of substantial solar energy. Join the evolution They claimed that the SEC just was not set up to operate on this back-up basis. That it would make uneconomic the huge capital spending on centralised power systems. Their doubts raised the possibility that if a home solar power pack was devised, the present power authorities would fight its introduction. Some studies suggest that by the turn of the century solar power could be providing as much as five per cent of the nation's total primary energy needs.

The CSIRO experts believe this is the upper limit, and two to three per cent is more likely. There is a third way to harness solar power biological conversion. Solar power is used by getting alcohol fuels from, plants and liquid and gaseous fuels from agricultural and urban wastes. Ampol Petroleum is starting a joint project with Bio Detroit is switching to that fnr Stereo AMFM RadioCassette player with tereo AMFM RadioCassette player with less weight, greater performance and economy "TOUPOZI SCXDPtS Kena 20TS from $14,395 (manual transmission). Prices shown are manufacturer's suggested retail and exclude normal on-road costs.

-Wteek Roid Te. September 1979. AMLmZm i-Li Australia falls into two main areas solar thermal energy, using collector plates to heat water and air, and solar conversion to electricity using photovoltaic systems. So la thermal applications in Australia are growing at a tremendous rate, enjoying for the past five years a growth rate of more than 60 per cent a ye'ar. production rates for solar thermal systems in Australia are 100,000 square metres of collection plates a year, equivalent to 25,000 separate domestic water heatings systems.

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