It's not too cool to be ridiculed
But you brought this upon yourself
The world is tired of pacifier
We want the truth and nothing else

And we are sick and tired of hearing your song
Tellin' how you are gonna change right from wrong
'Cause if you really want to hear our views
You haven't done nothin'

("You Haven't Done Nothin," by the one and only Stevie Wonder, 1974)

Note: At the time this PTOA Segment #202 was written, the phrase "Ok, Boomer" was not trademarked.

 

WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS NOW IS LOVE SWEET LOVE …
AND A DEPENDABLE SOURCE OF CLEAN ENERGY!

Your Mentor is "A Boomer" and is still OK

Of course Your Mentor is  a "Boomer!"

It takes decades to accumulate the wisdom that has thence been downloaded to PTOA Readers and Students!

Right here right now is an opportunity to acknowledge that several PTOA Readers and Students have commented that they are interested in becoming Process Operators and/or Process Technicians … yet do not want to spend their life's energy in careers that will increase global warming.

The process industry examples used so far in the PTOA  have admittedly been focused on the hydrocarbon industries.

The Good News is …

Keep on reading the Process Technology and Operator Academy Segments!

The fact is that the environmental costs of processing hydrocarbons have just been fully realized and accepted as fact during this 21st century.

Adding these costs to what would otherwise appear to be the much cheaper hydrocarbon-based energy standard suddenly makes the current and future "green energy alternatives" economically competitive.

PTOA Readers and Students are alive at an exciting time to witness and participate in the changeover from hydrocarbon-based energy to a variety of "Greener" and "Truly Green" energy sources.

Sooner than later, "Greener" and "Truly Green" energy sources will replace the current hydrocarbon standard.

As the "Greener" and "Truly Green"  processing industries develop and expand they will become more prominent factor in the energy sector of the global economy.

And as these "Greener" and "Truly Green" energy producing industries become a bigger slice of the energy pie they will need their own version of Process Operators and Technicians.

Likewise …

While the hydrocarbon energy standard is being retired, there will be a need for Process Operators and Technicians who can core competently work in the hydrocarbon fuels industry.

These Operators and Technicians will be well positioned to transfer their knowledge of managing the Process Variables of Temperature, Pressure, Flow, and Level to the corresponding application in "Greener" and "Truly Green" process technologies.

By the way … the easy part of the replacement equation is replacing hydrocarbon fuels.

As of the date this PTOA Segment was written the replacement problem for hydrocarbon based petrochemicals  …

which are used in a variety of products …

like pharmaceuticals and even replacement body parts …

does not appear to be getting sufficient attention.

 

 

 

The Green Processing Industries Will Incorporate Heat Transfer Fundamentals

To paraphrase the above paragraphs:

If the Process Technology and Operator Academy were written 10 to 15 years from now, there would be many more examples of  green industrial process industries that could be used to illustrate the basic principles of Process Technology … like:

"Heat Transfer" (featured in PTOA Segments #58 through #67) and

"How and Why Fluids Flow" (featured in PTOA Segment #158).

These fundamentals of process technology will be part of any energy producing or power producing plant.

Pickin' up what Your Mentor is puttin' down?

The collective solutions to global warming which exist today and are yet to be discovered are still going to require Process Operators and Technicians who understand how the "rules of the Universe" …

like the rules that govern "the modes of Heat Transfer" and how each of those heat transfer modes impacts the Process Variable (PV) Temperature …

are applied in any energy producing industrial plant.

Hey that makes sense because ...

as all PTOA Readers and Students know...

an increase in the PV Temperature means that heat energy has been transferred into  a mass of itty, bitty molecules.

The excited itty, bitty molecules start banging into each other … thus transferring more "heat energy" and increasing the PV Temperature! It doesn't matter if that heat source is from traditional sources of hydrocarbons or "Green" sources of hydrocarbons or some totally different non-hydrocarbon source!

 

The Role of Gas Turbines and Co-Generation
As Bridge Technologies to "Truly Green" Energy

Brilliant PTOA Readers and Students ...

meaning those who are reading the PTOA Segments in the intended sequential order …

could have predicted that Thermodynamics …

(aka the change of internal heat energy which can be measured as a  PV Temperature)

will be a feature in any energy producing technology!

How convenient that PTOA Readers and Students recently completed the PTOA Driver/Prime Mover Focus Study featuring Gas Turbines!

PTOA Readers and Students know that Gas Turbines are "Thermodynamic machines" which conjoin a Compressor to a Gas Turbine for the purpose of generating motive power or electricity.  While The Working Fluid (air) flows through the Engine, it's internal energy is controlled while increasing and then controlled while decreasing.

Hey, that sentence just described "Thermodynamics" … which human beings figured out just by studying The Almighty Universe!

Well .. guess what?

The 2017 New York Times best seller "Drawdown" edited by Paul Hawken states that a $280 billion dollar investment in the co-generation configuration of Gas Turbines and Steam Turbines will reduce CO₂ emissions by 3.97 gigatons by 2050.

Isn't that timely news!

Because smart PTOA Readers and Students who are reading the PTOA Segments in the intended sequential order are already knowledgeable regarding the co-generation of electricity and steam.

In PTOA Segment #197 PTOA Readers and Students learned how the considerable internal heat of the TEG produced by the Gas Turbine can be exchanged with Boiler Feed Water in a heat exchanger known as a Heat Recovery Steam Generator (HSRG). This co-generation of "Greener" electricity by the GT's Power Turbine and the "Truly Green" electricity (or power) that is derived from expanding the steam through a Steam Turbine is what Mr. Hawkin is advocating for in his book.   

 

The Role of Geothermal Power as a "Truly Green" Energy Source

As PTOA Readers and Students are reading this, the brain trust behind the application of innovative methods to drill deep into the earth's core are seeking investors. The technology will use microwaves to cut through rock to depths of 12 miles ... where beaucoup of heat is waiting to be transferred into water to create steam!

The steam that is produced can be sent to existing power houses, replacing the boilers in coal fired plants and replacing the Gas Turbines in more modern power plants with Steam Turbines.

The application of this innovate geothermal technology is expected to be online by the later 2020s and possibly will replace 50% of today's electrical generation by mid-century.

The mighty Steam Turbine was king before hydrocarbon technology replaced it and will once again provide a "Truly Green" source of energy for the Earth.

 

The Role of Nuclear Power as a "Truly Green" Energy

Nuclear power reactors are also designed to accommodate a controlled increase of a split atom's internal energy followed by a controlled decrease in the power of that same split atom. Dang! That's "Thermodynamics" again!

The same "Drawdown" resource predicts that a 1 billion dollar investment in nuclear power will reduce CO₂ emissions by 16.09 gigatons by 2050.

Your Mentor does not know if the above predictions includes the concept of micro nuclear reactors "for home use" which is in current headlines as this PTOA Segment was being created.

(Yes. The article features "for home use nuclear reactors" while simultaneously the miniseries "Chernobyl" is a huge hit on cable television and the engineers at the Fukushima Power Plant in Japan still don't know how they will dispose of radioactive water that has been gathering since the plant was ruined in 2011.)

Obviously, the capital investments in nuclear energy will include reactors that are specifically designed for the highly exothermic nuclear reactions that evolve when atoms are split and the energy between those nuclear bonds is released.

Those nuclear reactors are close-cousins twice-removed from the exothermic Hydrocracking Reactors which were featured in PTOA Segment #28 and shown in the nearby photo.

And the second verse is the same as the first:

Both the hydrocracking of hydrocarbons and the splitting of atoms are exothermic reactions; the rising PV Temperature that results must be controlled.

Here are some other PTOA Segments to-date that are 100% relevant to the nuclear energy technology application:

High Tech Instrumentation/Automation (PTOA Segments #11 and #12)
Heat Exchange (PTOA Segment #30)
Hyperbolic cooling towers (featured in PTOA Segment #41).

In summary:

PTOA Readers and Students who wish to work in the "Greener" and "Truly Green" process technologies should remain committed to the Process Technology and Operator Academy (PTOA) because the content is 100% relevant to their career goals.

PTOA Readers and Students have already learned the structural and operational details of technology that author Paul Hawken has identified as crucial to the reduction of CO₂ in the Earth's atmosphere by 2050.

 

Green Process Industries will also Involve
The Interrelationship between the PV Temperature and the PV Pressure

Furthermore …

PTOA Readers and Students already know about the interrelationship between the PV Temperature and the PV Pressure because that was the featured content of PTOA Segment #157 .

Thus, brilliant PTOA Readers and Students can predict that a competent understanding of the Process Variable (PV) Pressure will be required to operate, control, and maintain the energy-generating equipment of the future … whatever it may be.

For example, the "Drawdown" resource cited above predicts that biomass produced power will be an important "bridge technology" between moving off from the hydrocarbon-based energy standard to "Truly Green" sources of energy.

Heck, biomass produced energy can happen anywhere that there is garbage ... so like everywhere!

Sugar cane fiber is a fuel that is burned in Florida's New Hope Biomass Energy Plant.

The electricity that is generated powers the sugar cane plant as well as 60,000 nearby homes.

The steam that is produced in the process is also used by the sugar cane refinery.

PTOA Readers and Students should notice how the architecture of the New Hope biomass energy plant is quite similar to a hydrocarbon processing plant … they just start with a different feedstock.

And let it be emphasized that the the similarity is not limited to just common structure and architecture.

Even a biomass reactor that converts saw dust or whatever biomass waste into gases that fuel a generator will blow up under the right conditions if a Process Operator becomes distracted or complacent.

Gotta keep that in mind, Fred!

 

 

TAKE HOME MESSAGES: PTOA Readers and Students who are interested in "Greener" and "Truly Green" process industry careers should continue reading the Process Technology and Operator Academy.  Admittedly the PTOA uses the plethora of available resources from the hydrocarbon processing industry to illustrate process industry fundamentals. However the PTOA content is directly applicable to the developing and improving "Greener" and "Truly Green" process industries that will soon be more dominate in the world's energy-production sector. 

©2019 PTOA Segment 0202

PTOA Greener and Green Technology Focus Study

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