DOE's discretionary budget last year.......30 Billion dollars
Year DOE formed 1977 (35 Years*30 Billion) = 1 Trillion dollars.
Blowing moist air over poisonous, toxic, hygroscopic, Desiccant............Priceless
(no, I mean really, as in I doubt the EPA, OSHA, etc, is ever going to allow it).
Obviously that's a gross simplification, but it clearly illustrates a point of contention on the cost versus return.
NREL is planning to keep improving the tech for a few years, and then license it to industry. So don’t expect to see commercial versions of the DEVap for a few years…
There is the real problem. The fact that billions of our tax money is dumped into a project, in research dollars, only to have like one private company get the license for it.
I personally think they should be open source ideas, since they were used with collective tax money, not the property of whoever is the most politically connected or well off at the moment.
I've seen a lot of great ideas and technology die, because the wrong contractors received the license and sat on the idea, or made the price so high that nobody could ever afford to implement it.
This among many other fine ideas.
It's not that this country lacks smart people capable of smart ideas..........it's that this country often lacks the discipline, drive and motivation to implement them sufficiently. The government is often one of the worst methods of making that possible, because they are content with mediocrity and running perpetual deficits. Whereas the Private sector is often great at implementation, but only products that they have skin in the game with (or fund), not projects where they can buy a license/rights and squat on the technology forever (like oil companies with solar projects).
That's where my biggest criticism comes from.
I work for the government, as an Engineer, and my coworkers and I have created some amazing concepts, products, and designs. Unfortunately, I have seen very little of them ever make it to the light of day. The massive machine, called the bureaucracy, that decides priorities, funding allocations, and contracting (to outside vendors) has killed off far far more than it has ever actually utilized.
The rest has been killed by greedy, self serving, contractors that don't care about anything but sticking with the status quo.....as in their status quo.......I can't begin to tell you how many times I have seen private companies buy the rights to ideas like this only so they can never utilize them, but sue you for trying to use them, for attempting to undermine their current product services. Post edited by Mockery at 6/30/2012 3:07:02 PM
OMG energy recovery devices are so revolutionary . just like ice storage for chillers. ___________________________________________________________________________
Originally posted by: Mockery DOE's discretionary budget last year.......30 Billion dollars
Year DOE formed 1977 (35 Years*30 Billion) = 1 Trillion dollars.
Blowing moist air over poisonous, toxic, hygroscopic, Desiccant............Priceless
(no, I mean really, as in I doubt the EPA, OSHA, etc, is ever going to allow it).
Obviously that's a gross simplification, but it clearly illustrates a point of contention on the cost versus return.
NREL is planning to keep improving the tech for a few years, and then license it to industry. So don’t expect to see commercial versions of the DEVap for a few years…
There is the real problem. The fact that billions of our tax money is dumped into a project, in research dollars, only to have like one private company get the license for it.
I personally think they should be open source ideas, since they were used with collective tax money, not the property of whoever is the most politically connected or well off at the moment.
I've seen a lot of great ideas and technology die, because the wrong contractors received the license and sat on the idea, or made the price so high that nobody could ever afford to implement it.
This among many other fine ideas.
It's not that this country lacks smart people capable of smart ideas..........it's that this country often lacks the discipline, drive and motivation to implement them sufficiently. The government is often one of the worst methods of making that possible, because they are content with mediocrity and running perpetual deficits. Whereas the Private sector is often great at implementation, but only products that they have skin in the game with (or fund), not projects where they can buy a license/rights and squat on the technology forever (like oil companies with solar projects).
That's where my biggest criticism comes from.
I work for the government, as an Engineer, and my coworkers and I have created some amazing concepts, products, and designs. Unfortunately, I have seen very little of them ever make it to the light of day. The massive machine, called the bureaucracy, that decides priorities, funding allocations, and contracting (to outside vendors) has killed off far far more than it has ever actually utilized.
The rest has been killed by greedy, self serving, contractors that don't care about anything but sticking with the status quo.....as in their status quo.......I can't begin to tell you how many times I have seen private companies buy the rights to ideas like this only so they can never utilize them, but sue you for trying to use them, for attempting to undermine their current product services.
i whole heartrendingly agree as an engineer myself. trust me... these ideas NEVER make it to the marketplace. Post edited by novEmb3R at 6/30/2012 10:47:57 PM
I'm not seeing a successful product here yet. Didn't see anything about cost.
Have some questions like how is the desiccant maintained? Is it restored by blasting it with really hot air? I mean it could be somewhat beneficial in that you can heat it with natural gas instead of electricity to restore its functionality. But what I understand is that it take extremely high temps to restore a dessiccant. 200+ degrees F. Post edited by Stryk at 6/30/2012 10:51:25 PM
Originally posted by: Stryk I'm not seeing a successful product here yet. Didn't see anything about cost.
Have some questions like how is the desiccant maintained? Is it restored by blasting it with really hot air? I mean it could be somewhat beneficial in that you can heat it with natural gas instead of electricity to restore its functionality. But what I understand is that it take extremely high temps to restore a dessiccant. 200+ degrees F.
i don't know the specifics about maintaining desiccant wheels (i'll look into it) but i see this lack of logic in energy modeling all of the time. they choose a hvac system, slap on some expensive ERD and don't account for installation, maintenance, or life-cycle costs. the projects never come to fruition.
you can say this about heat recovery VRF type systems as an example Post edited by novEmb3R at 6/30/2012 11:05:03 PM
Originally posted by: Stryk I'm not seeing a successful product here yet. Didn't see anything about cost.
Have some questions like how is the desiccant maintained? Is it restored by blasting it with really hot air? I mean it could be somewhat beneficial in that you can heat it with natural gas instead of electricity to restore its functionality. But what I understand is that it take extremely high temps to restore a dessiccant. 200+ degrees F.
i don't know the specifics about maintaining desiccant wheels (i'll look into it) but i see this lack of logic in energy modeling all of the time. they choose a hvac system, slap on some expensive ERD and don't account for installation, maintenance, or life-cycle costs. the projects never come to fruition.
you can say this about heat recovery VRF type systems as an example
Exactly......the devil is always in the details.
Without specifics of implementation everything from perpetual motion, to free-energy, to time travel also appear possible.
That's why design by top down committee is often such a uselessly fruitless practice. And the government is truly phenomenal at such a practice.
You ever seen "Pentagon Wars", novEmb3R?
It's a great mockumentary (based off actual events) that I highly recommend if you can find a copy of it.
. just like ice storage for chillers.
