European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - March 19, 1986, Darmstadt, Hesse By Malcolm w. Browne new York times exhaust gases works Limestone steam to drive turbines in this fluid bed combustor Lime Stone and fuel Are added to an incan descent bed of Sand and air to generate steam Limestone re moves Fulfur from the exhaust. Air nozzles water from pump Calcium sulfite and Ash memories of 1979 s gasoline station lines in the . Have been dimmed by today s seeming abundance of cheaper Oil and the dash to exploit alternative Energy sources has slowed to a crawl. But even in the face of drastic reductions in research funds scientists and engineers Are taking some significant Steps toward softening the inevitable blow of the next Oil crisis. Recent achievements include the inauguration in Southern California of a unique commercial electric Plant powered by the heat of the Earth s crust the patenting of several important devices for making Large windmills cheaper and More reliable the opening in Norway of the world s first electric Plant powered by Ocean Waves and the invention of a mixture of Plant chlorophyll and Platinum that enables sunlight to split water into its constituents Hydrogen fuel and oxygen. Meanwhile innovative technology has created two new types of Coal fired electric plants one based on the conversion of Coal to Gas the other on combustion of Coal in a fluid mixture of Sand particles and air. Both systems Industry experts say can Burn Coal containing Large amounts of Fulfur without unduly polluting the atmosphere with the oxides of Fulfur and nitrogen. They therefore offer a clean Coal burning alternative to the Oil guzzling electric plants that predominate in new England new York and Florida. Overall prospects for a technological shield against a coming Oil depletion crisis remain in question. Dwain f. Spencer head of advanced Power systems at the electric Power research Institute in Palo Alto calif., expressed deep concern about the future. Five years ago he said in an interview govern ment and private Industry in the United states were spending about $3 billion annually on Energy research and development. Today we re spending Only about half that amount and i expect the research budget to drop by another 50 percent or so in the next two or three the reason for the decline is that Oil prices have moderated beyond All expectations removing the sense of urgency. In 1981, when the world Price of crude Oil peaked at $40.20 a barrel conservative estimates predicted that the Price in 1985 would be at least $80 a barrel. In fact Middle Eastern Oil today Sells for Only about $27.90, and United states produced Oil w. For As Little As $25. \ i m especially worried Spencer said that the decline in research and development will Lead to our losing the infrastructure that America needs to manufacture new Power generating equipment. Well end up dependent on Japan and Europe for the machinery we re going to need to meet our Energy demands and our bal Ance of payment deficit will become truly Mons despite the seeming glut of Oil some analysts warn that it will not last Long. Four months ago the world watch Institute of Washington disclosed an analysis showing that within 15 years Oil reserves in the United states Britain and Mexico will be essentially depleted. When that Hap pens Oil prices will again be at the mercy of Middle East producers possibly until Petroleum supplies run out for Good. Against this background Energy experts take satisfaction in recent innovations. A new Type of Power Generator Ca iad a Coal Gasi fiction combined Cycle Power Plant began operating at Daggett calif., in May 1984 and is now producing 120 megawatts of Power for the Community. Coal is roasted to produce a Gas consisting of Carbon monoxide and Hydrogen both of which Are fuels. Fulfur impurities Are chemically stripped from the Gas which is then burned to Power the Generator turbines. Although built As a demonstration Plant it represents one of the major innovations expected to transform America s Pover Industry in the 1990s, experts say. It is a proven technology whose Only drawbacks As with most of the innovations Are related to meeting the great expense of new plants. The other new Type of Power Generator envisioned for the coming decades is represented by plants now being built by the Northern states Power company of Minnesota the University of Colorado and the Tennessee Valley authority at Paducah by. These fluid bed combustor scheduled for completion in 1986, 1987 and 1988, respectively rely on a 65-year-old technology that is Only now being applied in the commercial generation of electric Power. In principle a fluid bed is a bed of Sand in a combustion chamber whose Botton has Fine holes through which compressed air is continuously forced. The rising air lifts and separates the Sand particles from each other creating a turbulent mixture of air and Sand that behaves in Many ways As if it were a True liquid it can be swirled like water Wood floats in it and bubbles Rise through it. When this mixture is heated to incandescence it becomes a fluid medium into which any kind of fuel Coal old automobile tires or even wet sewage can be pumped and burned at High efficiency. More important fluid bed combustion in the presence of powdered Limestone produces exhaust gases that Are free of Fulfur pollutants and pollution abatement is a hydrocarbon Loop \ computers Are getting better at translating documents from one language to another but the smart machines still turn dumb when it comes to unusual words or double meanings. Business and government representatives at a machine translation seminar in Luxembourg said computers can now successfully grind out reams of rough but understandable translations especially of straightforward technical material. But give a computer the trickier phrase fire safety in one language and it s Likely to come out to set safety on fire in another. One computer saw the English phrase baby seals understood baby but took seals from a list of plumbing words and came out with baby joints joints de Bebe in French. Oratory is out said Andrew Evans who is developing machine translation systems for Europe s tallest Tower of Babel the 12-nation, nine language european Community. Computers Deal Only with things of an unequivocal but for Peter de Mauro head of the Xerox corp s translation Section computers saved the Day in 1979 when the company wanted to sell a new copier in Spain but translators were late with a Spanish language manual. We did the Job in a few Days instead of weeks said de Mauro who pressed what was then a Pilot project on computer translation into service to do the Job. New York times Art California geothermal Well circulates brine in a closed Loop to draw heat from Earth s crust. Brine then boils hydrocarbon fluid to Gas which drives Turbine Generator. Key objective of planners. Since the United states has enough Coal to last several centuries Power Industry experts regard advanced Coal burning systems As keys to saving Oil. Other innovative technologies have shown recent Progress. One exploits geothermal Energy the natural heat of the Earth s crust created in part by the decay of such radioactive elements As uranium. Last june 21 the most advanced geothermal electric Plant in the world began operation in California s Imperial Valley near the mexican Border. Although it produces Only 70 megawatts experts figure that about 100 megawatts is needed for every 50,000 household the Plant May presage an important future for geothermal Energy at least on a regional basis. The Plant is essentially a Hole in the ground containing a double pipe through which Cool brine is pumped downward and hot brine returns to the surface. The heat of crustal Rock at Depths of 4,000 to 8,000 feet raises brine temperature to nearly 400 degrees fahrenheit hot enough for the fluid to turn to steam if not kept under pressure. After reaching the surface the hot brine heats a Light hydrocarbon fluid which boils into Gas and drives the Generator turbines. The Gas is then condensed into liquid for reuse. The system draws 30 percent More heat from the hot circulating brine than would be possible if the brine were simply allowed to expand into steam in the conventional Way. The Plant is so efficient officials say that the geothermal Well on which it stands will probably produce up to 30,000 megawatts of Power in the next 30 years. A key question for the Plant s operator the san Diego Gas and electric company is whether or not the Earth where the Well was drilled will regenerate enough heat to continue beyond 30 years. Experts in volcanic Hawaii where All electric Power is generated from the expensive imported Oil Are following the California Experiment closely. By Robert associated press de Mauro s Section now turns 50,000 pages a year of English text into French Spanish italian German and portuguese at the push of a Button. We used to have machines in storage for months waiting for the technical papers to be translated. Now they go straight to the Market Demauro said. Just about everyone is impressed with the Speed of computer translations. A computer translates a 1,000-word text in As Little As 15 minutes. Efficient use of the it system can Speed up the rate of translation by a Factor of four said Ian Pigott head of the machine translation program at the european Community. Half a dozen machine translation systems Are commercially available. The most advanced users agree is syst an developed in the 1950s by Peter Toma a hungarian born american. Translation computers contain dictionaries of hundreds of thousands of words and terms used in specific Fields of interest. If the syntax is simple they can recognize verbs nouns adjectives and adverbs and put these in the right order. The first convert was the . Air Force which. Began using it in 1970 to translate russian texts into English. Today it translates some 60,000 pages of military data annually. Since then the european Community the North Atlantic treaty organization the european space Agency the International atomic Energy Agency general motors West Germany s nuclear research Center and the French aircraft maker Aero spatial have begun using computer translations. For several years computers have been Able to Cross translate English French German italian dutch Spanish and portuguese. More recently japanese and arabic joined the list. Eriko Akazawa assistant manager of Japan s syst an corp., said that despite complexities of japanese her company produced 10,000 pages of English text in 1985. We expect to double this in 1986," she said. Her optimism was not universally shared however. I see no future in using japanese for it said Dale Bostad head of the air Force s machine translation office at Wright Patterson fab Ohio. Japanese is just too similar concerns were expressed at the conference about computer translations of arabic. The most ambitious user is the european Community whose 1,000 translators yearly churn out 800,000 pages of text in nine languages English French German italian dutch danish greek Spanish and portuguese. At dec Headquarters in Brussels officials say translating a Long document can take a month. The organization has been experimenting with syst an since 1976 and is now developing Eurora a european computer translation system at a Cost of $30 million. Page 14 the stars and stripes wednesday March 19,1986 the stars and stripes Page 15
