
Wood gas vehicles: firewood in the fuel tank - aphextron
http://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2010/01/wood-gas-cars.html
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yuhong
Urea/diesel hybrids would be fun, since every modern engine has to use urea
for SCR anyway.

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codewritinfool
Mother Earth News had an article about this:
[https://www.motherearthnews.com/green-
transportation/green-v...](https://www.motherearthnews.com/green-
transportation/green-vehicles/wood-gas-zm0z12amzroc)

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fpoling
Politicians in Sweden after WW2 had interesting mindset. They really tried to
prepare the country for various worst-case scenarios. Researching wooden gas
for cars was one thing.

Another is how they investigated if they should make own nuclear weapons. They
decided not to after getting assurances from industry that they can make an
atomic bomb within months if needed.

I wonder what other possibilities or backup technologies they considered?

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digi_owl
I find myself pondering the efficiency of removing the gasifier from the
vehicle and instead handling it similar to LNG is today.

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jermaustin1
This will make for an excellent premise for a post-apocalyptic story, where
eventually the organic biomass starts being over consumed. Basically "Soylent
Green" but with cars.

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gooseus
There was a talk from the Royal Institution just uploaded yesterday (talk was
in June), _The Apocalypse and How to Avoid It_ [0], where Lewis Dartnell
(author _The Knowledge_ [1]) describes a gasifier stove you can make from a
couple bean cans, and also brought up this gasifier engine technology and how
it was used in London during the Blitz. This article has a ton of useful
information that makes for a great followup.

Also at the talk were Vinay Gupta (Ethereum), Rosalind Eggo, and Hugh Lewis
discussing different avenues to potential Apocalypse and their likelihood,
etc.

[0]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPxBhqonZEQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPxBhqonZEQ)

[1] [https://www.amazon.com/Knowledge-Rebuild-Civilization-
Afterm...](https://www.amazon.com/Knowledge-Rebuild-Civilization-Aftermath-
Cataclysm-ebook/dp/B00DMCV5YS/)

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walshemj
As famously seen in dads army when they converted Jones the butchers lorry.

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maxlybbert
I’m not saying this is common knowledge, but it’s not a new idea:
[https://archive.org/details/FEMAEmergencyGassifer](https://archive.org/details/FEMAEmergencyGassifer)
,
[https://www.nrel.gov/docs/legosti/old/3022.pdf](https://www.nrel.gov/docs/legosti/old/3022.pdf)
. Then again, the fact that the article focuses on WWII cars says it’s not a
new idea.

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lawlessone
Could we make it better though? a lot of heat must be lost gassifying the
wood? Perhaps we could use that for thermometric power generation too.

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outworlder
Possibly. But harvesting that heat directly to 'motion' would probably not be
feasible. Storing that on batteries may be better, as they can be slowly
trickle charged, but provide a lot of power when there is demand.

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garrettgrimsley
I saw some of these in use while visiting DPR Korea. We weren't up close, but
the government tour guide confirmed that they were wood-burning trucks. Sadly
I was not allowed to photograph the trucks. Like the article mentions,
deforestation is an issue they can cause, something Korea suffers from
greatly.

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weinzierl
When resources were scarce during WW II in Germany there were various kinds of
wood gas vehicles. Here is a video of a 1942 tractor:

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RMVwbjp514o](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RMVwbjp514o)

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baud147258
From what I heard, it was the same in France, with various vehicles converted
to use wood gas too.

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averagewall
Important downside explained half way through: "if we were to convert every
vehicle, or even just a significant number, to wood gas, all the trees in the
world would be gone and we would die of hunger because all agricultural land
would be sacrificed for energy crops."

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Synaesthesia
In the last years of WW2 I think Japan chopped down the last of its trees to
make a bit of aviation fuel.

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Flavius
Wait, what? There's absolutely no evidence that "Japan chopped down the last
of its trees". Why would you say such a thing? You enjoy lying on the
internet?

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Synaesthesia
I saw it in the documentary series “The world at war”. I think the episode
about Kamikaze fighters. Japan had virtually no oil supplies. Here’s an
article about it.
[http://thenexthurrah.typepad.com/the_next_hurrah/2006/05/the...](http://thenexthurrah.typepad.com/the_next_hurrah/2006/05/the_japanese_ma.html)

Ok they don’t chop down all of their trees. Of course they still have trees.

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mrfusion
Would a steam engine make more sense? Then you could run it on anything.

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comicjk
In order to be efficient and powerful, a steam engine needs high-pressure
steam, which can only be safely contained by thick, heavy boilers and pipes.
This makes miniaturization of steam engines for cars difficult. Gasification
of wood allows you to keep the benefits of the internal combustion engine.

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maxerickson
I think the bigger issue is adapt vs rebuild.

The Doble steam cars are at least on the cusp of practical.

(they are very high maintenance compared to modern cars)

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archgoon
Thanks; I had never heard of the Doble Steam cars until now. I found this
video of Jay Leno driving one.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUg_ukBwsyo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUg_ukBwsyo)

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totalZero

      coal monoxide is a slow burning gas
    

I've never seen anyone refer to CO as "coal monoxide" before.

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taejo
It looks like the author's first language may be Dutch, where carbon monoxide
is "koolmonoxid" and "kool" can mean both "coal" and "carbon" (although there
are more specific words for coal such as "steenkool" = "stone carbon").

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alkonaut
Same in most Germanic/Scandinavian languages I believe. Carbon and Coal are
synonymous.

Coal as in coal power, coal barbecue, and the element carbon use the same
word. That’s not a coincidence.

Apart from some exotic forms like diamonds, trees or rabbits (less pure), coal
is how we normally encounter carbon.

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jakobegger
In German "Kohle" means coal, and "Kohlenstoff" is carbon. It's not the same
word.

(But carbon monoxide is "Kohlenmonoxid")

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CptMauli
But "Kohlenstoffmonoxid" is the actual correct term.
[https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kohlenstoffmonoxid](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kohlenstoffmonoxid)

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clord
Nice thing about wood power is that as long as you have a sustainable source
of wood, you're 100% solar-powered _and_ carbon neutral. That is to say, it's
a source of energy that is (can be) non-fossil, nor derived from any fossil
sources, and which recycles it's own CO2 emissions.

There are very few other alternatives that can claim the same. Perhaps Hydro?
Solar panels don't offset their construction CO2 costs, and in fact almost
can't even pay back their own construction energy costs if you factor in
batteries plus materials, mining, and shipping.

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gozur88
>Nice thing about wood power is that as long as you have a sustainable source
of wood, you're 100% solar-powered and carbon neutral. That is to say, it's a
source of energy that is (can be) non-fossil, nor derived from any fossil
sources, and which recycles it's own CO2 emissions.

As long as you're happy pouring carcinogens into the air, sure. Also, compared
to oil or coal there's not much energy in wood, so it doesn't scale very well.

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xyzzyz
There's a lot of energy in wood compared to coal. Wood has around 2/3 of the
energy of coal by mass. What do you think coal is made from?

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aidenn0
Isn't most of the mass of wood water?

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sitharus
Dried wood suitable for burning is around 20% water at most, else it won't
burn with much heat. It can go down to around 6% IIRC for kiln-dried wood
suitable for construction.

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jjoonathan
Boiling water costs a helluva lot of energy. Do these engines recover that
energy?

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jabl
How would they work if they didn't?

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jjoonathan
At low efficiency.

