I was tagged by Kristina, to list 8 facts about myself. Because I was asked, I can say whiny things. If you don't like the whiny things I say, take it up with whoever started this 8 things meme. I am supposed to link back to her, and to inflict this on 8 bloggers myself. I have decided that I won't inflict this on anyone. If reading this, you want to blog about 8 things, feel free to, but I don't feel comfortable asking anyone to do it.
I actually have been very busy, working on global warming, nitric oxide, and a blog about postpartum psychosis and infanticide. I think that infanticide is a evolved feature to protect the mother's life and reproductive capacity under times of metabolic stress. Low NO mimics those times of metabolic stress and lowers the threshold for infanticide.
1. I very rarely complain, my philosophy being that of doing something rather than complaining about it. I grew up in a big family, and if someone else did something, you never criticized it, unless you were willing to do better. As a consequence, I have an extreme tolerance for many things.
2. I am single, and I don't like being single. Perhaps this relates to #1. Perhaps not.
3. I donate blood regularly. They call me essentially as soon as I am eligible again (hint: that means I am in good health, straight, don't use self-injected drugs, don't frequent sex workers, and am free from STDs, hepatitis, and HIV).
4. I eat turkey every day at least once, sometimes twice. Mostly it is for the tryptophan which is a serotonin precursor. I have had depression in the past (pre-nitric oxide) and it helped then. I see no reason to change it even though my high NO level has essentially eliminated my long term depression and I am tapering off my meds.
5. While I eat breakfast I sit in front of a 500 Watt quartz-halogen lamp ($10 from Home Depot) to prevent SAD (seasonally affective disorder) (not that I ever had it). It does boost my mood a little, it is trivial to do, so I do it.
6. I recycle. Bottles, cans, jars and flyash. The company I started to commercialize my invention for recycling flyash has now recycled well over 4 million tons of flyash.
7. I haven't watched any TV since I saw part of Superbowl 2006.
8. In the winter I set my thermostat at 60. In the summer I turn off the pilot on my gas heater and it makes an observable difference in my gas consumption.
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4 comments:
"inflict the meme on others" hee hee.
Glad you made the list anyway. Now, I'm off to Google flyash, because I'm wondering how the cremated remains of household insects could amount to much. ;p
When coal is burned to generate electricity, generally it is ground into a fine powder, blown in the boiler, and burned as a dispersed powder. What ever doesn't burn, whooshes through, is quenched and is collected as flyash. It is called flyash because it flies through the boiler. The ash that stays behind is called bottom ash. When that type of boiler was first developed, it was a great innovation because some of the ash was gotten rid of by going up the stack. They don't let that happen any more, it is all collected.
When the ash is quenched, it remains glassy, and is pozzolanic, that is it will react with lime to form cementicious material. Just like the ancient Romans used pozzolans of volcanic ash and lime in their construction.
Because flyash is a pozzolan, it is a good additive to concrete, where it can replace some of the cement. That can only be done if the flyash is low in unburned carbon. If it is high in carbon all you can do is landfill it.
What I invented and commercialized was a process to separate the carbon from the flyash.
A 1000 MW power plant will burn about 500 tons of coal an hour. At 8% ash, that is about 45 tons of ash per hour (the ash plus 10% carbon). We separate the carbon from the ash and then sell the ash to concrete producers where they replace some of the cement in their mixes, yet get a concrete that is stronger and cheaper and more sulfate resistant.
To make a ton of cement, 2 tons of minerals need to be mined, and a ton of CO2 is emitted into the atmosphere. About 20-30% of the cement in concrete can be replaced on a 1-1 substitution with flyash. So for each ton of flyash recycled, a ton of CO2 is not emitted into the atmosphere.
Excellent work! Thanks for explaining.
I'll have to keep pozzolans in mind next time I discuss Pompeii with one of my classes on Roman culture-----I've never been able to donate blood: Too short, and thank you for being able to!
And thanks for all your contributions to Autism Vox. Regards from Kristina
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