Until electric vehicles and hybrids become de rigueur, fossil fuels will continue to power the vast majority of America’s automobiles for the foreseeable future.
And as it happens, America’s lumbering big rigs use up a lot of this non-renewable resource. A Fast Company article puts it bluntly: “Trucks are miserable when it comes to gas mileage. America’s 2.2 million freight trucks get about six miles per gallon on average, usually with cargo.” All told, that’s 36 billion gallons of diesel fuel burned annually by freighters.
But a study from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory found that adding trailer skirts, tail fins and other drag-reducing devices to America’s fleet of semi trucks can mean big savings in fuel consumption and dollars, as well as significantly cut CO2 emissions, Ensia reports.
The skirt (which is attached to the lower sides of a trailer) and the tail (which is affixed to the back) works by reducing air resistance over and around the vehicle as it moves along the road. According to a news release, researchers found that these panels — which are only utilized by 3 to 4 percent of the nation’s semi trucks — can reduce aerodynamic drag by as much as 25 percent, which represents about a 13 percent decrease in fuel consumption.
“Even a minor improvement in a truck’s fuel economy has a significant impact on its yearly fuel consumption,” says lead researcher Kambiz Salari in a statement. “For example, 19 percent improvement in fuel economy, which we can achieve, translates to 6.5 billion gallons of diesel fuel saved per year and 66 million fewer tons of carbon dioxide emission into the atmosphere. For diesel fuel costing $3.96 per gallon, the savings is about $26 billion.”
MORE: Chicago Has Rolled Out the Country’s Very First All-Electric Garbage Truck
It might take some time and effort to retrofit millions vehicles with these fashionable-sounding accessories, but the hardware would help the nation’s heavy-duty trucks meet President Obama’s strict new fuel standards (he’s ordered a 10 to 20 percent increase in fuel economy by 2018, depending on class of truck). In a speech, the president noted that these vehicles only make up 4 percent of traffic on America’s roads, but account for 20 percent of the carbon pollution from the transportation sector.
Encouragingly, California’s trucks are already suiting up. The state’s Air Resources Board mandated the installation of trailer skirts in 2013, and it’s already paying off for some. A trucking company owner tells the Times-Tribune that the skirts, which cost about $1,500 to $2,000 each, pay for themselves in three or four years. Another trucking owner adds that they also save two-tenths to three-tenths of a mile per gallon on a trip, which amounts $2,000 to $3,000 in savings, per year, per truck.
Tag: fuel consumption
The U.S. Navy May Have Found A Game Changer in Renewable Energy
The U.S. Navy is known to call itself “a global force for good,” and thanks to a recent renewable energy breakthrough, it may be living up to its reputation.
Last week researchers at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory’s (NRL) Materials Science and Technology Division announced the successful flight of a small model airplane powered by a liquid hydrocarbon taken from seawater. Yes, that’s right. The ocean.
While it may just sound like a group of scientists flying a toy plane, the development could mean a future powered by one of the world’s largest infinite natural resources (here comes the oil industry hand-wringing).
The process, which extracts carbon dioxide and hydrogen from ocean water and recombines it into hydrocarbon chains, may advance efforts to refuel aircraft carriers and vessels while out at sea. The Navy currently relies on 15 oil tankers to deliver almost 600 million gallons of fuel to vessels at sea per year, according to the BBC. Though it takes an exhaustive 23,000 gallons of ocean water to create just one gallon of fuel, vessels equipped with nuclear reactors onboard can process the very water they float on to refuel, without having to wait for an oil tanker to help out.
[ph]
Researchers anticipate the new process will be ready in the next seven to 10 years, with the goal of dramatically reducing the $4 to $5 billion the military spends annually on 1.3 billion gallons of fuel. The potential green fuel would cost an estimated $3 to $6 per gallon—an expensive undertaking—but within target of the rising costs of gas. In 2012 the Navy paid about $3.60 a gallon.
Currently the Navy’s 289 vessels rely on oil-powered fuel but approximately 72 submarines and some select aircraft carriers are powered by nuclear energy. So should we expect to run our cars on saltwater anytime soon? Not so much. The Navy hopes to partner with universities for further research and plans to scale up the system onto land-based stations before shipping off a ocean-powered ship.
Regardless, the new development means that reliance on oil could be a thing of the past in the not-so-distant future and yes, some day you could be pumping the Atlantic and Pacific over regular and premium at the corner station.
This Bizarre Bacteria Could Clean Up the Oil Business
What if some of the biggest problems in the oil industry could be solved by a tiny, nearly undetectable bacteria? That’s what University of Illinois scientists have suggested after discovering microbes called Halomonas that have been chowing down on their fuel-rich surroundings a mile underneath Illinois. The big issue with oil extraction is its major disturbance to the environment. Crude oil from the Illinois Basin’s porous sandstone is currently siphoned with steam or chemicals, a process that’s been harsh to the surroundings, UI researchers said.
But as the News-Gazette reports, this microbe can naturally break down oil without leaving any chemical byproducts, which would allow oil companies to easily scoop up sludge that’s normally too heavy to extract. “There’s great interest now in being able to harness the power of microbes to find oil and gas, to break down oil and gas in the subsurface and actually being able to refine it, and to be able to use the microbes that live down there to help us extract it,” said Bruce Fouke, UI professor of geology and microbiology and principal investigator on the study.
MORE: How a Bag of Mushrooms Can Clean A Polluted River
The researchers have also found that this amazing bacteria — which thrives in complete darkness, extreme pressures and temperatures up to 122 degrees Fahrenheit — can turn toxic oil byproducts into less harmful substances. Varieties of Halomonas have even helped eat up the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill and possibly the 2010 BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico. (Fun fact: its fittingly named cousin, Halomonas titanicae, is currently gobbling up the Titanic.) Now that’s a bacteria we — and the oil industry — can get behind.