New world of electrical power generation

[james_s]

The biggest remaining residential load is the washing machine. It heats up 20 liters of water, and runs a beefy motor for an hour.

American washing machines don't heat the water, at least most of them don't, they take in separate hot and cold feeds from the wall. It's been a long time since I've measured my Maytag Neptune but IIRC it consumes about 0.6kWh per cycle, not much at all really. The dryer on the other hand is 5.5kW and also runs for about an hour.

[kaz911]

Ethanol is bad for engines - they run ok with it but the problems Ethanol create is huge.

The engine manufactures was up in arms until they realised it would increase their service income and part sales by a lot. Then they got quiet.

But the ethanol eats rubber and silicone over time. It attracts humidity and cause condensation. It causes phase separation when the ethanol attracts too much water - and water is heavier than the fuel so it sinks to the bottom of the thank (where inlet to the engine is)

So to avoid the above - you have to keep you tank almost full to minimise condensation. And you have to add stabilisers every time you refuel unless you use the device every day. The stabilisers are usually only good for < 12 months.

So for generators, lawn mowers, boat engines and other "seasonal use" engines - E based fuel is really bad.

When you then count the extra service and parts needed over time and stabilisers - you probably do not have any environmental benefit at all.

[NiHaoMike]

The dryer on the other hand is 5.5kW and also runs for about an hour.

A (first generation) heat pump dryer takes that down to 1.2-1.5kW although for longer for about half the energy use. Newer ones likely do even better. Or switch to a drying rack or clothesline for no energy use.

[kaz911]

The dryer on the other hand is 5.5kW and also runs for about an hour.

A (first generation) heat pump dryer takes that down to 1.2-1.5kW although for longer for about half the energy use. Newer ones likely do even better. Or switch to a drying rack or clothesline for no energy use.

A full 9 kg load of cotton on my Miele heat pump dryer is about 1.5 kWh (if filters are clean) and is EU A+++ rated. I don't think there are many that are much more efficient yet.

The biggest plus compared to our old dryer - it does not heat the room very much. With the old dryer (10'ish years old) - the small room would be 30+ deg c when the dryer was running. Now we neither hear it nor feel it.

Last year we made an effort to limit our consumption in total - so low energy appliances etc. so this year so far - despite having a new electric car as well  - we are actually using the same kWh as we did a year ago just after moving in the new house. And since we have the electric car we could get on the 5p rate nighttime rate with Octopus Go - so until now we have paid a LOT less per month due to load shifting.

But that will probably change April 1st with the rate changes in the UK. We expect prices to increase 55-65% on electricity and gas.  I do not know what price Octopus Go will change to. But new Octopus Go signups now are asked to pay 7.5p / kWh vs our 5p / kWh for night time usage. So those rates are already up 50%.

But I do wish they would "implement" the German "SmartGrid" signalling here so we could have the machines just turn on when we have cheap electricity available or activated by "solar surplus"

[nctnico]

Ethanol is bad for engines - they run ok with it but the problems Ethanol create is huge.

That might have been true 40 years ago but the fact is that ethanol is being mixed into gasoline for decades (for example in France) and all modern consumer cars can deal with it just fine for several decades already.

[kaz911]

Ethanol is bad for engines - they run ok with it but the problems Ethanol create is huge.

That might have been true 40 years ago but the fact is that ethanol is being mixed into gasoline for decades (for example in France) and all modern consumer cars can deal with it just fine for several decades already.

There is nothing I wrote about ethanol that is not true today - as it was 15 years ago or 40 years ago.

Yes cars can deal with it (if you use your car on a regular basis) - but Ethanols "behaviour" have not changed.

Fuel lines have become better at dealing with Ethanol - but over time they still deteriorate much faster than if they run on "none E fuels" - so you have to change fuel filters more often on "seasonal use" products as particles from fuel hoses gunk them up - and that is with "E fuel" rated fuel hoses.

Most of my "electronics" business is marine and boat related. The damage we see in boats from Ethanol is quite big. Boats have big fuel tanks (some 100-800l x 2 or even x3) - and we have gigantic fuel water filters on the engines - and that is still not enough. E fuel causes engines and tanks to rust inside due to attracted humidity. Now when we winter prep a boat we run the engine with non-E based fuel if we can find it. Then we empty the fuel tank(s) completely if < 20% or fill them to 95%. But it is not nice to have a boat yard full of completely full "petrol" filled speedboats and cruisers.

Prep - or "decommission" time for the engines takes almost twice as long as it used to and is not super safe when emptying fuel tanks. When we empty the tank - we have a separate water filter/separator and usually that needs emptying once for every 50-100l (so about 50-70ml of water)

But as I said - most problems with E fuel is for products that is not used on a regular basis. If you use your car everyday - you are probably fine.

My own boat has been sitting in the water for the last 2 years - and engines run every 2 weeks by a friend - and fuel water filter has been exchanged twice despite having almost full tanks and stabiliser in the fuel every 12 months.  Now when I go for the first time for easter - it is booked to have all fuel removed (roughly 400l) because we have no idea how much is slushing around in the bottom of the tanks. But if we took the boat out on open sea - we would quickly find out how much water is in the tanks...

[james_s]

That might have been true 40 years ago but the fact is that ethanol is being mixed into gasoline for decades (for example in France) and all modern consumer cars can deal with it just fine for several decades already.

Well that's just great, but not all cars are modern, and even a modern car is not helped if it is rarely driven. On top of that, cars are only one use of gasoline. I recently had to throw away a whole tank of gasoline that went bad in my classic car that is only driven a few times a year. I have also had countless carburetors destroyed in small engines. For my generator I finally started driving 25 miles to one of the few stations that sells pure gas without that destructive shit mixed into it. Sure it's fine in my daily driver, even being 32 years old it has no problem with it, but if I wasn't driving it regularly it would be a problem and it's a huge problem in all sorts of other stuff. It pulls water out of the air and corrodes metal parts.

[james_s]

A (first generation) heat pump dryer takes that down to 1.2-1.5kW although for longer for about half the energy use. Newer ones likely do even better. Or switch to a drying rack or clothesline for no energy use.

My friend has a heat pump dryer, it works reasonably well but for me it wouldn't make economic sense. My electricity is still only $0.10/kWh and I run a load of laundry about once every 2 weeks so about $1.50/month, that's nothing.

A drying rack is a viable option for many but it won't work for me. My house is completely surrounded on 3 sides by tall trees that drop pollen (which I'm allergic to) and sap. It also drizzles rain a substantial part of the year. My grandmother used one in her back yard in the summer when I was a kid though.

[NiHaoMike]

A drying rack is a viable option for many but it won't work for me. My house is completely surrounded on 3 sides by tall trees that drop pollen (which I'm allergic to) and sap. It also drizzles rain a substantial part of the year. My grandmother used one in her back yard in the summer when I was a kid though.

Drying racks also work indoors. If that would raise the humidity too much, get a dehumidifier, that's pretty much what a heat pump dryer is in the first place.

[nctnico]

A drying rack is a viable option for many but it won't work for me. My house is completely surrounded on 3 sides by tall trees that drop pollen (which I'm allergic to) and sap. It also drizzles rain a substantial part of the year. My grandmother used one in her back yard in the summer when I was a kid though.

Drying racks also work indoors.

Yup. We never dry the laundry outside; always on a few indoor lines next to the washing machine. Don't need a dryer at all. Most of the laundry is dry overnight.

[Siwastaja]

Also don't wash ridiculous amounts of laundry and don't wash yourself to ridiculous extent.

Not smelling bad is enough. No need to overwash (yourself or clothes) with some ridiculous safety margin like smelling bad is comparable to nuclear meltdown.

We (2 people) wash clothes maybe once a week, and dry the laundry indoors overnight. No significant energy consumption in either washing or drying.

[kaz911]

Also don't wash ridiculous amounts of laundry and don't wash yourself to ridiculous extent.

Not smelling bad is enough. No need to overwash (yourself or clothes) with some ridiculous safety margin like smelling bad is comparable to nuclear meltdown.

We (2 people) wash clothes maybe once a week, and dry the laundry indoors overnight. No significant energy consumption in either washing or drying.

Well try that with 2 children in school uniforms, school training clothes and school swim clothes. We would have to triple the amount of clothes we buy to dry it "manually" outside or inside. And as the children grow like weeds - every 3-4 months they need a wardrobe change. 

It is MUCH cheaper to wash and machine-dry 2-3 times per week... I think. 4/5ts of the clothes washes are the children's.

I do prefer "outside air dried" - but right now that is an unobtainable dream that happens only once a quarter when the weather is fast enough to dry it before night time.

[james_s]

Also don't wash ridiculous amounts of laundry and don't wash yourself to ridiculous extent.

Not smelling bad is enough. No need to overwash (yourself or clothes) with some ridiculous safety margin like smelling bad is comparable to nuclear meltdown.

We (2 people) wash clothes maybe once a week, and dry the laundry indoors overnight. No significant energy consumption in either washing or drying.

I have to wash my hair daily or it turns into a big greaseball, I don't think I do a ridiculous amount of laundry though, I usually run out of either socks or underwear first and run a load when that happens.

[uer166]

That might have been true 40 years ago but the fact is that ethanol is being mixed into gasoline for decades (for example in France) and all modern consumer cars can deal with it just fine for several decades already.

Well that's just great, but not all cars are modern, and even a modern car is not helped if it is rarely driven. On top of that, cars are only one use of gasoline. I recently had to throw away a whole tank of gasoline that went bad in my classic car that is only driven a few times a year. I have also had countless carburetors destroyed in small engines. For my generator I finally started driving 25 miles to one of the few stations that sells pure gas without that destructive shit mixed into it. Sure it's fine in my daily driver, even being 32 years old it has no problem with it, but if I wasn't driving it regularly it would be a problem and it's a huge problem in all sorts of other stuff. It pulls water out of the air and corrodes metal parts.

Why stop here? Even older cars require lead additives in gas to seat their valves properly and avoid damage. Let's go back to leaded gasoline so you can daily drive your grandpa's 60 year old car? 32 yr old cars are an edge case that shouldn't be considered thAt much in the environmental big picture, especially if it's not a fatal issue if it's being often used.

[Siwastaja]

I drive a 25 year old car and it consumes less fuel and emits less CO2 than 90% of the new cars people are buying. The reason is really simple; gasoline engines were already in 1996 nearly as efficient as they ever can be, but cars were smaller.

One of the root causes for many issues (effect of increasing gas prices, climate change, lack of parking space, etc. etc.) is the constantly increasing size of the car; width, height and weight.

The trend should be the opposite, really, but business-wise, it makes more sense to sell problems than solutions.

[T3sl4co1l]

Not quite true; just a combination of, manufacturers don't want to put in the work to materially improve MPG, and customers don't want to pay for it.  Hybrids have somewhat extended that, using a small engine over a narrow power band and filling in the gaps with electric boost, making MPGs over 50 feasible.  As I recall, the limit is somewhere around 80 or 100 MPG, at which point aerodynamics dominate, even basic stuff like crashworthiness gets really hard to meet, and exotic materials are required to keep curb weight absolutely minimal.

Lemme see here... oh yeah, it was the VW (X)L1 that did it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_1-litre_car
Which even got much more efficiency than that, but was toned down for the "production" model.

But other than that, yeah, pretty dismal.  Last year I upgraded my car by 16 years, yet the weight and mileage are almost identical.  It does achieve that with a slightly smaller engine (1.8 vs 2.2L), but that's about it.

I would love to see a trend towards actually-effective public transportation, and walkable cities, but it's a long, LONG way off for the US's suburban strip-mall addiction.

Tim

[nctnico]

I drive a 25 year old car and it consumes less fuel and emits less CO2 than 90% of the new cars people are buying. The reason is really simple; gasoline engines were already in 1996 nearly as efficient as they ever can be, but cars were smaller.

No, not at all. First of all the small volume turbo charged engines really are more efficient compared to non-turbo charged engines. On top of that they can deliver more power as well. Expect a 15% increase in efficiency (= 15% lower fuel consumption) when used in a comparable weight / size car (turbocharged 1.0 litre versus non-turbocharged 1.6 litre engine). Hybrids with a true Atkinson cycle engine can easely reach a 30% decrease in fuel consumption (1.8 litre Atkinson hybrid versus 1.6 litre atmospheric). Both numbers not from the manufacturer's spec sheets but from actual driving conditions (*).

The problem however is that people keep buying bigger and bigger cars and many of them are not hybrids; that is where the real problem is. To make things worse, car manufacturers are allowed to compensate CO2 emissions between electric cars and ICE cars. Governments should not have allowed that. Currently only Toyota is on track to make efficient cars; the rest is far behind still selling gas guzzlers.


* I have been doing quite a bit of research into which car to buy next. Since a significant part of the costs of a car goes into fuel and I try to find a car with the lowest TCO, fuel consumption is a big factor. The car I think I want to buy (1.8 hybrid) is similar in size to what we have now but it has a much lower fuel cosumption: around 5.5 litre / 100km according to websites that collect fuel consumption data from owners. Our current car has a fuel consumption of 8.1 litre / 100km. Last year it broke down so we had to drive back home in a rental for >2k km. That rental car had a similar size compared to our own car (we needed be able to bring all of our luggage as well) but it's fuel consumption was around 6.7 litre/100km (including driving some stretches at high speed on the German highways where there is no speed limit).

[Siwastaja]

I drive a 25 year old car and it consumes less fuel and emits less CO2 than 90% of the new cars people are buying. The reason is really simple; gasoline engines were already in 1996 nearly as efficient as they ever can be, but cars were smaller.

No, not at all. ...  Expect a 15% increase in efficiency ...

Yes, yes at all. This 15% increase is exactly what I meant by "nearly". We are in complete agreement regarding the numbers.

If you increase the efficiency by 15% and then weight and frontal area times drag coeff by 50%, you get a car that consumes 30% more.

This is exactly what can be seen. One of the most popular family cars used to transport people currently consumes 7.5 l/100km on paper (and some 8.5 in reality). It's an SUV which is unsuitable for driving in difficult terrain, and no one uses it for that. Yet that is what is most popular. My 25-year old car, which is not an SUV, consumes 5l/100km on paper (actually measured at 5.8 l/100km).

Large cars have just become popular, completely eating up all the engine improvements, and sadly, even beyond. The opposite should be happening, IMHO. Everybody should be driving something resembling a 1980's Nissan Micra but hybrid EV, or even better, just battery EV. Instead, even the Nissan Micra has become bigger.

Hybrids are even larger, so-called monster SUV category is where hybrid "shines" apparently. All the benefit from the technology has gone into size increase, not fuel savings.

People who do this shit deserve the gasoline price increases.

This size increase reflects in everything; emissions, living costs, parking space availability, etc. I can quickly name two parking halls where I work which are built in 1980's or 1990's that only work with 2/3(!) capacity with today's cars, because modern cars simply do not fit in the parking spaces (3 spots between each two pillars, but only 2 cars fit).


If someone told you they have came up with a 83% efficient SMPS to replace 80% efficient old version, would you tout this as some breakthrough miracle SMPS? No, you wouldn't. Yet this is the scale of internal combustion engine development during last 2-3 decades.

[emece67]

.

[Siwastaja]

Ignoring the USA maybe, I think "average" personal commuter car has consumed approx. 7.5 l/100km for the last... 60-70 years?

Available peak power and size has significantly increased. Collision safety has improved, which partially explains the fact that external size increase is larger than internal.

I'd hazard a guess the peak low was around early 2000's; engines were just a few % away from today's, and size craze has not started yet. SUVs became mainstream (status symbol for lower middle class) some years later. Manufacturers responded by making all models larger.

[Someone]

Ignoring the USA maybe, I think "average" personal commuter car has consumed approx. 7.5 l/100km for the last... 60-70 years?

Nope:
https://www.iea.org/articles/fuel-economy-in-the-european-union
https://www.iea.org/reports/global-fuel-economy-initiative-2021/explore-data

Emissions regulations squeezed efficiency "backwards".

[NiHaoMike]

Hybrids are even larger, so-called monster SUV category is where hybrid "shines" apparently. All the benefit from the technology has gone into size increase, not fuel savings.

The 2022 Toyota Sienna gets 36 MPG, on par with some sedans.

[nctnico]

Hybrids are even larger, so-called monster SUV category is where hybrid "shines" apparently. All the benefit from the technology has gone into size increase, not fuel savings.

The 2022 Toyota Sienna gets 36 MPG, on par with some sedans.

Indeed. Claiming that hybrid technology only serves large cars is nonsense. Toyota has been proving that hybrid works excellent for small / regular cars (like the Prius) beyond any doubt for over 20 years.

[Siwastaja]

Claiming that hybrid technology only serves large cars is nonsense.

Indeed, like claiming that the Moon is actually cheese.

I'm glad no one is making such strange claims. I see you love fighting with strawmen. That's good for you, because it's very easy to win, and no one loses. The only thing that suffers is the SNR of the forum.

[JohanH]

Ignoring the USA maybe, I think "average" personal commuter car has consumed approx. 7.5 l/100km for the last... 60-70 years?

Available peak power and size has significantly increased. Collision safety has improved, which partially explains the fact that external size increase is larger than internal.

I'd hazard a guess the peak low was around early 2000's; engines were just a few % away from today's, and size craze has not started yet. SUVs became mainstream (status symbol for lower middle class) some years later. Manufacturers responded by making all models larger.

This is all quite interesting. The most efficient car I've owned was a 1988 Honda Civic with 1.3l gasoline engine, carburetor, four cylinder and four valves per cylinder. Even the VW Golf 1.6 diesel I have today has worse fuel consumption if you count liter/100km. The Honda was obviously lighter and not as secure as the VW Golf. And it had rust problems, so I definitely learnt how to use a MIG with it. It even rusted around the windshield. I think it was finally scrapped around the 450 000 km mark. Now today's cars seem to have less issue with rust, but some have electrical issues instead. And there is a lot more components in modern cars.