World oil resources: their assessment and potential for the twenty-first century.

Summarizes the various assessments of world conventional oil resources and unconventional (eg tar sands, heavy crude, oil shales). Outlines the three factors that fostered the still-rising oil costs: the shift to smaller fields; the move to offshore fields; and the shift to exploiting unconventional sources

Anisotropic Outflows and IGM Enrichment

We have designed an analytical model for the evolution of anisotropic galactic outflows. These outflows follow the path of least resistance, and thus travel preferentially into low-density regions, away from cosmological structures where galaxies form. We show that anisotropic outflows can significantly enrich low-density systems with metals.Comment: Proceedings of Chemodynamics 2006, Lyon, 2 pages, 1 figure, style file include

Long Term Energy Strategies

Because-of the long lead times in the energy sector and long market penetration periods, decision making must be prepared early. But uncertainties, and especially the uncertainty of future energy demand, make it a difficult task. Among possible methods of comparing energy options, the WELMM approach has been developed, and is introduced

World Oil Resources Assessment and Potential for the 21st Century

Over the last thirty there have been about two dozen estimates made for world oil resources. Few of them are really independent or new estimates. Moreover, most of them disclose neither the method of assessment which was used nor the data on which the estimates rely. The situation is worse still for unconventional world oil resources such as heavy oil, tar sands, and oil shales. This is the reason why IIASA has launched an up-dating survey of past (and sometimes very old) estimates. This paper summarizes the efforts of the Resources Group to better understand both world oil (conventional and unconventional) estimates and also some technological and/or economic factors affecting the future availability of liquid fuel

On Fossil Fuel Reserves and Resources

This is a review of the major findings on coal, oil, and gas resources from the three independent groups of experts of the World Energy Commission which were presented to the Tenth World Energy Conference (WEC) at Istanbul in September 1977. These aspects are put in perspective with the current thinking on fossil resources of the Resources Group of the Energy Systems Program, and are used to estimate some possible future fossil production in relation to a 35 TW demand scenario used in the Program

Note on Molten-Salt Reactor Strategies

In IIASA Research Report RR-74-7, Wolf Hafele and Alan S. Manne present a model optimizing strategies on a transition from fossil to nuclear fuels: substitution of LWR and FBR for coal for the use of electricity, and of hydrogen from HTGR process heat for petroleum-and-gas for the use of non-electrical energy. This paper treats another transition from fossil to nuclear fuels, i.e. that from coal to the molten-salt reactor (MSR) for electrical use, and from petroleum-and-gas to MSR process heat for non-electrical use. MSR technology offers important advantages for power generation: avoidance of fuel element fabrication, rapid and inexpensive reprocessing, on-line refueling, high specific power, good neutron economy and high-temperature operation at low pressure. A review of the status and future of the PISR program suggests that the MSR technology should still be considered as one of the possible nuclear options for energy supply. Therefore, it is worthwhile to study the MSR strategy as well as the FBR and HTGR strategies. The aim of this paper is to compare the MSR strategy with the Hafele-Manne strategy via an example of the optimal transitions based on MSR technology, as opposed to today's situation where virtually all electrical and non-electrical energy demands are met by coal and petroleum-and-gas, respectively

The WELMM Approach to Energy Strategies and Options

The development of energy resources requires more and more natural or human resources: on the one hand because of the difficulty of "harvesting" primary energy resources. and on the other because of the complexity of the sequence of processes necessary to convert these primary resources into useful resources for an economy (final energy). In this context the WELMM approach has been designed to evaluate the resource requirements for the development of energy resources. WELMM focuses mainly on five limited resources: Eater, Energy, Land, Materials, and Manpower. The WELMM evaluation is implemented at the level of the major facilities concerned in the harvesting and conversion of primary energy resources into find resources. All the WELMM data are stored in three different data bases (Resource Data Base, Component Data Base, and Facility Data Base). They are meant to be used to enlarge and complete the traditional economic comparison of energy processes, energy strategies or energy options

Phase 1 of the automated array assembly task of the low cost silicon solar array project

The results of a study of process variables and solar cell variables are presented. Interactions between variables and their effects upon control ranges of the variables are identified. The results of a cost analysis for manufacturing solar cells are discussed. The cost analysis includes a sensitivity analysis of a number of cost factors