Perfect gas storm
The present US and Canadian energy price escalation can be relieved by maximizing available sources for natural gas and enhancing the efficiency of the delivery infrastructure to market centers. Improved transportation resulting in higher producer netbacks can only encourage development of new sources, both domestically and overseas.
Beyond the first wave of LNG imports catering to North American burner specs lie the higher NGL content mixes favored by Asian markets and high ethane content gas in Alaska. These mixes are not interchangeable with gases burned in North America. However, the most effective energy delivery through the transport of these mixes is made in this most dense state-direct delivery to market hubs, where such mixes are then processed, can be achieved using existing technology.
Approximately 80 million tonnes/year of world LNG supplies are contracted to Pacific markets from regions which have direct sea access to North America. Imagine if gas for the northeastern US market was delivered this way and then intermingled or batched with developing domestic supplies from the Rockies.
The efficiency of high-NGL natural gas pipelines over long distances is indisputable as evidenced by the consistent performance of the Alliance Pipeline since its operations began in 2000. Therefore, would it not be viable to build a new system of interlinked transcontinental pipelines from proposed West Coast terminals to eastern markets to complement traditional installations?
Additionally, such a system would support a nominal volume pipeline from Prudhoe Bay to the Alaska South Shore region, having a flow rate to serve both Alaska’s needs for supply to Fairbanks and the Kenai Peninsula plus a sufficient volume for sea delivery to the West Coast for the Lower 48 states and Canada.
Subsequently, movement of additional volumes of Prudhoe Bay and Point Thompson reserves through the ANWR corridor will serve to enhance the delivery of Canada’s arctic reserves to southern markets down the Mackenzie corridor.
Would you not agree we can ease natural gas prices for the consumer by applying a solution that offers greater assurance of supply and practicality and end the “gas crunch” rhetoric?
Ian Morris
Campbell River, BC
Biomass vs. photovoltaics Donald Anthrop makes the point very effectively that biomass from wood, a renewable favored by environmentalists, cannot significantly reduce our dependence on oil imports (OGJ, Sept. 5, 2005, p. 12). And in a broader sense, biomass per se is a very inefficient way to convert sunlight into usable energy.
Some further calculations demonstrate this. Anthrop notes that ¿new growth¿ wood from forests produces about 47 ft3/acre/year. This translates into about 0.94 tons/acre/year, or about 12 MMbtu/acre/year, not counting combustion losses in use nor energy consumed to plant, grow, harvest, transport, and process the wood, activities which are also energy-intensive.
By contrast, the average amount of solar energy hitting the Earth¿s surface each year is about 20 billion btu (the ¿solar constant¿ of 1,367 w/m2 at Earth¿s distance from the sun, halved for reflection from the upper atmosphere and for absorption and reradiation into space times the Earth¿s cross sectional area divided by the Earth¿s surface area).
So the conversion efficiency from sunlight to biomass (wood, gross btu) is about 0.6%. By contrast, modern photovoltaic cells convert sunlight directly to electricity with an efficiency of 15-20%, or 25-35 times more efficiently. Biomass, in almost any form including ethanol, is a loser compared to photovoltaics.
Arlie M. Skov
Santa Barbara, Calif.
