Ken Johnson
Energy 113: Fossil Fuels
February 17, 2011 4:12 am | by Ken Johnson | Blogs | CommentsThis will be the last of my 13 ‘Soapbox’ episodes dealing with ‘Energy’ systems, most of which I consider as “exotics”, in that they are interesting oddities that could be used as energy sources, however, fossil and nuclear fuels are safe, cheap, and plentiful, so why bother?
Energy 112: Ethanol
January 19, 2011 4:09 am | by Ken Johnson | Blogs | CommentsNo discussion about energy sources would be complete these days without saying something about the alcohol based fuels. The bulk of these come in two general forms: ‘methanol’ . . . also known as “wood” alcohol, and ‘ethanol’ . . . also called “grain” alcohol.
Energy 111: Magneto Hydrodynamics and Total Energy Systems
December 20, 2010 4:22 am | by Ken Johnson | Blogs | CommentsDon’t let the title scare you into excluding this from your reading schedule. An attempt will be made to simplify the concept and its uses. Let’s start by calling them MHD and TES respectively for short. Many practical applications of TES were evolved from its age-old principles over a half century ago...
Energy 110: Fuel Cells
November 30, 2010 3:54 am | by Prof. Ken Johnson | Blogs | CommentsThis episode will continue looking at various so-called “green” energy sources with regard to how ‘green’ they are, the state of their technology, and possible economic impact on their users as well as on the non-user taxpayers.
Energy 109: Thermoelectrics
October 14, 2010 6:07 am | by Prof. Ken Johnson | Blogs | CommentsSeveral readers of these episodes disagreed with my approach of using a ‘worst case’ example of a private residence solar cell electrical power generation system as the sole source of power (ENERGY 108: SOLAR CELLS II)...
Energy 108 – Solar Cells II
September 16, 2010 5:14 am | by Prof. Ken Johnson | Blogs | CommentsPerhaps you have wanted to do your part to promote the end of fossil fuels and thought about having a photo-voltaic (PV) system installed on your new home. Frankly, that is a dream mostly created in you by very devious, but typical, Ruling Class politicians who are always out there dangling a carrot...
Energy 107 – Solar Cells I
August 23, 2010 4:49 am | by Ken Johnson | Blogs | CommentsThis episode pertains to a different kind of solar energy electric power generator, the Photovoltaic Cell (PV), commonly called ‘solar cells’. But before we embark on that subject, a reference was made in the reader Comments of the last episode (ENERGY 106), about another Solar Thermal Energy system...
Energy 106 – Solar Thermal
July 15, 2010 5:04 am | by Ken Johnson | Blogs | CommentsBefore becoming engrossed in the topic of this episode, there were some rather interesting recent occurrences associated with the last episode, “Energy 103 – Wind Turbines II”, which alluded to my theory that tornados which occur in ‘Tornado Alley’ in the Midwestern US...
Energy 105 – Wind Turbines II
June 21, 2010 5:08 am | by Ken Johnson | Blogs | CommentsA couple of statements made about vortices in previous episodes have prompted several comments and queries. Then just recently there was a news story about an airliner incident where it hit an “air pocket” or CAT (Clear Air Turbulence) as it is called.
Energy 104 – Wind Turbines
May 17, 2010 5:13 am | by Prof. Ken Johnson | Blogs | CommentsIn a previous episode, the subject of wind turbines was briefly discussed. They could be considered in an ‘esoteric’ class because of their various disadvantages, primary among them is the lack of reliability, i. e., if the winds don’t blow or they blow too fast, there is no electricity.
Energy 103 - Our Major Source
April 20, 2010 5:06 am | by by Prof. Ken Johnson, Ret. | Blogs | CommentsThere is no doubt the primary source of the Earth’s energy has been and continues to be the Sun (officially called Sol).
Energy 102 - Heat Engines
March 18, 2010 5:38 am | Blogs | CommentsThere is no question the overwhelming majority of ‘mechanical’ energy utilized in this country has as its source the output of Heat Engines, i.e. devices that convert stored solar energy in fossil fuels to ‘mechanical work’.
Energy 101 - The Basics
March 8, 2010 4:23 am | Blogs | CommentsSince there is a great worldwide debate going on about “energy”, some of the debate participants need to refresh their memories, or in some cases, learn something about the basic ‘Energy Laws’ (EL), associated with it’s utilization and conversion from one form to another.
