Me

[napaeric]

I am a winemaker by profession. I originally thought of biochemistry for "The Green Revolution" to help feed people. That was until a lecture by Dr. Emil Myrak Chancellor of UC Davis. He explained that starvation in the world had more to do with economics and politics than food production.

I fell back on winemaking as an interesting science career. Before graduation at UCD I started a project to build an electric car. That was before UCD got seriously involved with hybrid car design. I have recently been following the PHEV concepts, PV progress and most recently energy storage.

After some thought on batteries I have now come to some observations.

Energy in must be very close to energy out, very little wasted energy.
Ability to cycle nearly an infinite number of times.
Should use Oxygen as the oxidizer since it is abundant and cuts down on weight.
Must be recharged or replenished very quickly.
Large capacity for size/weight.
Non toxic and recyclable.

Flow batteries are almost unheard of but may hold the greatest promise for energy storage for vehicles and power utilities.

A fluid that could be charged up by exposure to sunlight and discharged by use of Oxygen from the air and would not breakdown in storage tanks would be in the right direction.

Oh yes, this is supposed to be me introducing myself. I live in the Napa Valley and do something evil to grapes which seems to make people happy.

Scientific American was my childhood magazine. Books I read then included Euclid's Plane Geometry, Catch 22 and The Idiot. Since I went out for sports as well I was not teased much.

I am a novice in all things, but I keep practicing.

Eric

[lemit]

Welcome! Very interesting, uh, well, interests.

I'll be interested in reading what you have to say about "The Green Revolution." There are some places in the "Earth Sciences Forum" where you can post.

Again, Welcome!

--lemit

[Moontanman]

Oh wow, wine maker huh? I can see you being very popular here!
Welcome to the fold napaeric. uh, oh yeah, I have lots of mulberries right now, any tips for making a nice sweet wine out of them?