Cyclone Hamish

[Elspode]

Forecast pretty clearly expects it to skirt the coast. The radar link you posted doesn't show a lot of rain at this point, but it says you've got a pretty steady 40 kph wind or thereabouts. Hope you and the rest of Australia don't get hit hard, and here's to some good, slow, nice rain that you all desperately need.

[ZenGum]

The exciting bit was a conatiner ship being tossed about in heavy seas and losing 31 shipping containers full of ammonium nitrate. This is used as a fertiliser, and last time this stuff was "lost" in Moreton bay the kelp beds grew from 5 or 6 feet to 20 to 25 feet. But the exciting bit it, if you mix it with deisel oil, it is an explosive, much favoured by McGyver and Timmy MacVeigh... and one of the containers damaged the ship as it fell causing 3,000 liters of deisel fuel to leak.

I'm a little disappointed that the two substances didn't mix and explode. That would ahve been cool. Instead it all just got messed up by the waves.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by ZenGum

But the exciting bit it, if you mix it with deisel oil, it is an explosive, much favoured by McGyver and Timmy MacVeigh... and one of the containers damaged the ship as it fell causing 3,000 liters of deisel fuel to leak.

I did that once when I was a kid, what a mistake. My oldest bro is greater than 10 years older than me. He was a navy diver and went to UDT school and had some cool books on UTD stuff. I was enamored with them. So here I am with an M-80, a bag of fertilizer from the garage and a few quarts of motor oil. We dig a hole in the field next to the house and pour all of it to gether, plug in the M-80 and WHAM. Holy good God and Jesus! bout blew ourselves up. Trotted away just in time before the cops and FD showed up. Lesson learned.

[Aliantha]

yes, the oil spill is the big problem at the moment. Clean up is costing $100k per day after the first day. There are pelicans and other sea birds covered in the oil which they're trying to catch and clean. Lots of beaches have a slurry on them now, and some turtle eggs have been moved (which isn't really a great idea because the little turtles will be lost forever after).

I'm still waiting to hear why the bloody thing was trying to travel through a cyclone anyway. Idiotic if you ask me.

Most of the containers have sunk to the bottom in about 100m of water, so they pose no threat even if they're not recovered. The chemical will dissipate over time and the containers will provide habitat for underwater sealife.

[Aliantha]

Els...we're not getting much rain at all, and not likely to. That link is too old now to show where the low has gone to. It'll just be showing the local loop for my general area.

Thanks for the kind thoughts though. It would have been nice to get a bit more rain, but such is life.

[Aliantha]

Dazza is being interviewed on Australian ABC live radio about the oil spill today at 11.50am. That's an hour and a half from now if anyone's interested.

Here's a link if you want to listen online. It'll be during the 'Qld Country Hour'.

[ZenGum]

My figure of 3,000 litres of fuel was wayyyyy off.

3,000 tonnes is more like it. Not good.

[Aliantha]

It's disgusting. Did you see it on the news last night?

[sugarpop]

Originally Posted by Aliantha

yes, the oil spill is the big problem at the moment. Clean up is costing $100k per day after the first day. There are pelicans and other sea birds covered in the oil which they're trying to catch and clean. Lots of beaches have a slurry on them now, and some turtle eggs have been moved (which isn't really a great idea because the little turtles will be lost forever after).

I'm still waiting to hear why the bloody thing was trying to travel through a cyclone anyway. Idiotic if you ask me.

Most of the containers have sunk to the bottom in about 100m of water, so they pose no threat even if they're not recovered. The chemical will dissipate over time and the containers will provide habitat for underwater sealife.

Another GREAT argument for the world to develop and use alternative energies. NO MORE OIL SPILLS!

[classicman]

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapc...ick/index.htmlAustralia declares disaster over oil spill

"It appears the volume of oil involved is much greater than originally reported by the Pacific Adventurer. And the effect of the oil spill is more widespread."

The Pacific Adventurer sustained damage early Wednesday when Cyclone Hamish struck the waters of eastern Australia with more than 125 kph (77 mph) winds. The cargo ship lost 30 of its 50 containers of ammonium nitrate about 13 kilometers (8 miles) off the coast of Cape Moreton. Those containers are still missing.

The damaged ship also spilled a large amount of oil that is covering at least 60 kilometers (37 miles) of beach in and around Brisbane, according to Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). Video Watch sludge washing up on shorelines »

The ship's owner, Swire Shipping, initially said no more than 42,000 liters (11,100 U.S. gallons) of oil escaped from the ship, but now says that "substantially more oil was spilled," ABC reported Friday.

[sugarpop]

If we didn't have to transport oil, there would be no more oil spills. Personally, I am reeeeally hoping we can start developing biofuels made from algae. It can be made into any kind of fuel, even jet fuel, from what I understand it burns a lot more cleanly, it doesn't take a lot of space to grow enough of the stuff to supply the entire nation, it can done pretty quickly... WTF are we waiting for? (here's a link http://cc.pubco.net/www.valcent.net/...gro/index.html
http://www.globalgreensolutionsinc.com/s/Vertigro.asp)

[HungLikeJesus]

sugarpop, you might be interested in this algae-to-biofuel/bioenergy case study, written by Krassen Dimitrov, Ph.D., in 2007.

From the introduction:

At the core of GreenFuel’s proposed process is the generation of algal biomass using the flue gases from a fossil fuel-based power plant and solar energy as inputs. The idea is extremely attractive as flue gases are CO2-containing pollutants that need to be dealt with and sunlight is free and abundant. The resulting biomass can be monetized via the following mechanisms:
1. converting it to biodiesel via transesterification;
2. converting it to bio-ethanol via fermentation;
3. converting it to liquid/gas fuels via pyrolysis;
4. generating heat/electricity by burning it (with or without gasification);
5. selling it as feed protein;
6. disposing it in a landfill and receiving credits for avoided emissions;
Production of biofuels will also have carbon mitigation potential by the virtue of avoided fossil fuel use, and thus will benefit from future carbon credits. In contrast, production of animal feed will not be carbon beneficial: since the displaced feeds are also of photosynthetic origin, there is no net emission avoidance.
Looking at these options, there is a very clear winner as to what is the most economically effective way to monetize the process, namely, conversion of algal lipids into biodiesel. Biodiesel is a clean-burning biofuel that enjoys generous subsidies and can be sold wholesale for as high as $2.50 per gallon 1. With gross heating value of 126,200BTU per gallon, that would equate to $18.80 per GJ, which compares very favourably with:
• coal at $1-1.5/GJ,
• natural gas at $7-8/GJ,
• gasoline at $11.40/GJ (assuming $1.50/gal wholesale)
• corn ethanol at $16.82/GJ (assuming $1.50/gal, incl. subsidy).

... (snip)

As can be seen from Table 1, the maximum biodiesel yield from the S.W. USA is less than 1.5 gal/yr/m2. According to a construed example in GreenFuel’s patent application, an algal plant generates 342,000 bbl of biodiesel per year in a 1.3km2 area, which would translate into 11 gal/m2/yr. Given biodiesel’s energy content of 126,200BTU per gallon, this would equal to energy capture of 46.6W/m2 for a region with mean annual PAR levels of 105W/m2, or in other words a Q of 44.4%! Considering that the theoretical efficiency of photosynthesis is 27%, this claim is an unconscionable exaggeration that may get GreenFuel in trouble with the patent office.

...

Finally, looking at the dollar flows per m2, it is obvious that they are very low. According to a study on the greenhouse industry in New York State for the year 2000, the average sales for all greenhouses (p. 4) were $161.77/m2/yr, which resulted in gross profits of $38.82#/m2/yr (24% gross margins). Thus, the gross profit per m2 from a simple hothouse was more than 10x higher than our best-case projected gross revenue from a PBR plant.

To fully understand the points he's making you'll want to read through the rest of the linked PDF.

#in year 2000 dollars