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Some scientists are serious about resurrecting zeppelins for cargo

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Re: Some scientists are serious about resurrecting zeppelins for cargo

#151

Post by tonyedgecombe »

melling wrote: post #136
tonyedgecombe wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Emissions from air travel are set to triple by 2050. Also that 2.5% doesn't take into account the affect of NOx on climate or contrails. The IPCC estimate the effect of air travel is 2 to 4 times as high as that expected just from CO2 emissions.

In 30 years? We could reduce the CO2 emissions of our electric by half within 10 years. Begin moving to electric vehicles en masse within a decade. Maybe a big 2025 goal should be a priority? We should be doing more now so we need to do less later.

If we continue expanding air travel it will take our whole carbon budget within 30 years (possibly more). This means we need everything else to go to zero. It seems unlikely that we can achieve that.

I don't think we can exclude air travel just so a few people can continue jetting around the world.

Re: Some scientists are serious about resurrecting zeppelins for cargo

#152

Post by [deleted] »

etaioinshrdlu wrote: post #50

I got a dumb idea. Permanently stationed blimps around the world that never land. And cable cars for moving between them, on pulleys. Pros: Energy efficient: no need to generate lift. No need for fans to move the cars as you are on pulleys, which are more efficient. Minimal noise! You could go as fast as you want but your efficiency will start to drop due to drag. It can't be any worse an idea than a hyperloop can it…

[deleted]

Re: Some scientists are serious about resurrecting zeppelins for cargo

#153

Post by [deleted] »

dr_dshiv wrote: post #132
dr_dshiv wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, they could harvest sea water or condensation to generate hydrogen. To produce one kilogram of hydrogen, 12 cubic meters, it takes 9 kg of water and 50 kWh of electricity. The solar Zeppelin described above could generate 2,589 cubic meters of hydrogen a day. At this rate, it would take 77 days to fill the Graf Zeppelin's 200,000 cubic meter capacity

So, perhaps we could float giant plastic solar balloons in a lake -- and semi-organically "grow" enormous hydrogen cells for aerostatic lift.

[deleted]

Re: Some scientists are serious about resurrecting zeppelins for cargo

#154

Post by TulliusCicero »

Stratoscope wrote: post #74
dr_dshiv wrote: post #46

Airplanes fly high and have tiny porthole windows. You can't appreciate the beauty of the earth. Zeppelins can have huge windows and fly relatively low. The experience of flight would be amazing -- focused on the beauty of the natural world. Zeppelins offer a low-carbon earth-conscious luxury good that the superrich should spend money on -- so that eventually it's affordable to the rest of us.

I got to ride on the Airship Ventures Zeppelin NT over the SF Peninsula and South Bay back in 2012. It was as awesome as you may guess. There were a couple of windows we could open, and a seat in the back with a big panorama window behind it. We were in the same cabin with the pilots, and they were happy to show us how the zeppelin worked and make little detours if there was something we wanted to see. We even got to…

> Deutsche Zeppelin Reederei still runs passenger flights out of Friedrichshafen. If you ever get to Germany, you won't regret taking a Zeppelin ride.

Looked this up just now and Jesus Christ, 450 EUR for a 60 minute tour flight??

Re: Some scientists are serious about resurrecting zeppelins for cargo

#156

Post by zabzonk »

n0rbwah wrote: post #146
brnt wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think since Hindenburg fabrics has developed tremendously, and collision, perhaps even explosion safe fabrics for zeppelin hulls could be possible.

Hope they still get covered with a thick layer of thermite.

You mean "thermite, the well-known incendiary compound"? https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Thermite

Re: Some scientists are serious about resurrecting zeppelins for cargo

#157

Post by leni536 »

cforrester wrote: post #42
VonGuard wrote: post #36

This article doesn't seem to take into account that Helium is becoming scarce, and when used in airships, it's eventually just released and lost forever. NYT Article on the shortage: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/16/science/helium-shortage-p... We used to have a strategic Helium reserve in the US for zepplins and so forth, then it was just kept for chemistry and other purposes. I think we started selling it down un…

I wouldn't say that helium is becoming scarce in the sense that we can't get any more, though. I may be wrong, but my understanding is that it's just expensive to store, so nobody wants to do it if it's not worth the money. If air ships started to "take off", there would surely be more money in producing helium.

According to [1] Helium actually escapes Earth's atmosphere at the rate of 50g/s. And most of the production of Helium is from gas reserves, and not capturing from the atmosphere.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_escape#Earth

Re: Some scientists are serious about resurrecting zeppelins for cargo

#158

Post by zabzonk »

WalterBright wrote: post #78
VonGuard wrote: post #36

This article doesn't seem to take into account that Helium is becoming scarce, and when used in airships, it's eventually just released and lost forever. NYT Article on the shortage: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/16/science/helium-shortage-p... We used to have a strategic Helium reserve in the US for zepplins and so forth, then it was just kept for chemistry and other purposes. I think we started selling it down un…

Should just use hydrogen. We learned how to safely fly airliners full of jet fuel, we can solve the safety problem with a bag full of H.

You can throw a lighted match into a can of jet fuel and it will go out - try this with hydrogen.

Re: Some scientists are serious about resurrecting zeppelins for cargo

#159

Post by reacweb »

teraflop wrote: post #51
cforrester wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't say that helium is becoming scarce in the sense that we can't get any more, though. I may be wrong, but my understanding is that it's just expensive to store, so nobody wants to do it if it's not worth the money. If air ships started to "take off", there would surely be more money in producing helium.

Helium is scarce in much the same way that crude oil is scarce: there are plenty of reserves still in the ground, but we are consuming them orders of magnitude faster than they were produced, and as the reserves dwindle the costs of extraction will rise. Helium is a chemical element, and aside from nuclear reactions (which are economically infeasible for non-microscopic quantities) we can't produce more of it.

We do not produce crude oil any more because bacteries are more efficient at digesting dead trees.

Re: Some scientists are serious about resurrecting zeppelins for cargo

#160

Post by [deleted] »

rootusrootus wrote: post #143
b0rsuk wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would also rather use hydrogen. The Hindenburg disaster was spectacular, but not especially deadly! 36 fatalities, 62 survivors. Compare to modern passenger airplanes, where EVERYONE tends to die. If modern dislike for zeppelins is mostly due to Hindenburg, it's irrational.

> airplanes, where EVERYONE tends to die Overall, about 95% of passengers survive airplane crashes. If you arbitrarily restrict the stats to just the most severe crashes, it's still over 50%.

[deleted]
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