various links

https://www.amazon.com/amaranth-seeds/s?k=amaranth+seeds

http://southwestdesertflora.com/WebsiteFolders/All_Species/Vitaceae/Vitis%20arizonica,%20Canyon%20Grape.html 

https://www.americansouthwest.net/plants/wildflowers/monarda-pectinata.html 

Hoffmannseggia glauca (Indian rushpea) | Native Plants of North America

Ocotillo,

https://g.co/kgs/mmehT4 

creosote bush,

https://g.co/kgs/PqzLBg 

https://calphotos.berkeley.edu/cgi/img_query?query_src=photos_index&where-taxon=Ambrosia+dumosa 

Endeavor to Persevere!

Off-grid post, 4.28.20

alfalfa: link;

Alfalfa is useful in feeding animals like rabbits, which I am considering as a meat source.

Off-grid post, 4.13.20

I've been consolidating my info sources lately. I may resume making informational videos. However, they'll not be posted on Youtube. These will be for my own use. Since I expect to not be so much online as before, the videos won't be useful online. They'll be on a stick for my reference.

There are three books on my old Kindle. I've been upgrading the bookmarks and notes on the device. The one I've worked on today was the one about shelters. It is a comprehensive book on how to make shelters out of available materials. In my own case, it may be hard to make a shelter out of trees when there aren't any.

But not to worry. There are a lot of good ideas here that I can use. I haven't given up on the idea of making the Quonset concept work. As a matter of fact, the book gave me an idea that gives me the confidence that I can make that work after all.

I don't know when I'll make the move, if ever. My health is the deciding factor. If I feel good enough in the next year and a half, I may do it.

Pigweed: A possible food source?

Pigweed: Pictures, Flowers, Leaves and Identification | Amaranthus retroflexus: Pigweed (Amaranthus retroflexus) is wild, edible and nutritious food. Identify pigweed via its pictures, habitat, height, flowers and leaves.


 and

Yucca faxoniana - Wikipedia

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_faxoniana

As a part of my goal to consolidate all my info sources, I am studying the Kindle book about plants that are found in the Trans-Pecos region of Texas. This is where I have my 40 acres.

I list a couple of links. One is for amaranth, aka "pigweed". It so happens that this plant is just about everywhere. It is thought of as a weed, but it does have food value. I'm not so sure that I have any of this growing wild on my land. If not, it could possibly be considered as a "crop" to cultivate.

The other link is to the yucca, which is definitely present on my land. It is a species known as "Spanish Dagger". In one of my videos, there is one visible that was overturned. I suspect that it was overturned by some free-ranging cattle in the area. Cattle will knock one of these over in order to get at the flowers, which are edible. But there aren't that many of these yucca, so free-ranging cattle have to work hard for just a little nourishment. That particular one was just about 5 feet tall. The bigger ones on the property can be too big for even a cow to knock over.

I don't like the idea of somebody else's cattle to be free-ranging on my land. But that is a different subject.

Off-grid, 3.26.20

98.6 Degrees, The Art of Keeping Your Ass Alive, by Cody Lundin

Cody Lundin's Aboriginal Living Skills at www.alssadventures.com ( link )

Some brief bullet points:

-Reality check

-Discussion of book, method of imparting his message

-Not a "field guide", rehearsal as opposed to bringing along books

-What is a "survival kit"?

-Simplicity stressed throughout book

-How survival situations get started

-Enemies to your survival

-Prior training for potential emergencies is the wisest move

-Several lists to memorize ( my recommendation )

-Stress impairs fine motor skills, but not gross physical ones

-biggest people killer is exposure

-controlling fear and the "Party on!" attitude

-must keep hydrated!

-Preparing your kit--- KISS principle, ( keep it simple, stupid )

-Panic proofing

-Tell people where you're going and when you're expected back

-Imcomplete list here, as I haven't finished the 2nd reading of the book

Off-grid post, 3.22.20

Obviously, there's not a lot going on with this blog lately. One problem is that I just don't spend that much time on the plans. But the plan is still a go for some time in the future. It may be in the next two years, or not at all. It all depends on what happens.

In the meantime, I continue to practice on what I know. One thing I did today may help a bit. I collected all my sources of information, and placed it in one spot. There's a lot of it. A lot to review as I wish.

I started to make some instructional videos, but events side-tracked that effort. Perhaps I can start that again.

One resource is my Kindle. It is the original Kindle when it was introduced. I bought this thing back in 2008. The Kindle has a few resources, and one of those I reviewed today. It is about the plants that I may be able to use out there. I was thinking of evaluating that once I spend enough time out there to do so. Yeah, one more thing on the list.

As of this writing, there's the Wuhan virus going around. It seems a pity now that I am not out there growing my own food. It seemed safer here. Perhaps it still is. There is no perfect safety anywhere. There is a downside to every choice you make. Regardless of what many people may be thinking, this thing is really not much different from the many risks taken on any given day---virus or not.

You can talk yourself into trouble a lot easier than you can talk yourself out of it.

off-grid post 2.16.20

Off-grid post Feb 16, 2020 Construction ideas Use of cattle panels A slab for a floor  A water tank as a means to rainfall catchment A possible use for a Quonset cattle panels Update: Using cattle panels I'm thinking up new ways to use cattle panels in construction.  I have already tried using them for a Quonset structure.  The latest ideas are to use them for making a thin, steel-reinforced concrete slab for a water tank and a possible floor for a new Quonset structure concept. A slab for a floor The slab is not intended to replace the concrete pods for the roof that will cover the trailer.  It will be integrated into the structure instead.  Since it will not be load bearing, it doesn't have to be very thick.  This will simplify my task considerably. The slab can be a floor for a Quonset, a sidewalk, or configured as a water tank for rainfall catchment.  None of these are going to require a really thick layer of concrete. I can enclose an area of the slab so that rainwater can roll off the roof into a tank that I make myself. Currently, I am planning a sidewalk just outside the door to the trailer. It could actually go all the way around the trailer.  With a sidewalk, I can avoid tracking in a lot of dirt. Part of the slab can be a sidewalk, with the other part as a floor to a water tank.  The slab would be positioned so that the water will run down the roof and fall right into it. I could extend the slab so that a Quonset structure could be built on top of it. Cattle panels are a metal grid about 16'x4.33' A 32'x2' water tank can hold hundreds of gallons of rainwater.  Cinder blocks or a metal wall can be built on the slab and covered.  There would have to be an opening for the water to fall into it from the roof. Lots of ideas, lots of plans.  But nothing out there yet.  Someday...

Maybe it is time to rethink this move

I moved the off-grid stuff to this blog.  Also the energy and space stuff to this blog.

But this blog isn't getting much attention from me, and I'm spread out a bit thinly.

Perhaps I will make a move to put the space and energy stuff on the original blog, and this blog will have only my off-grid project.

I'll have an announcement soon if I decide to go that way.

If I do, this will be only a personal blog.  I don't suppose people will be all that interested in my own little project.

It will be kept public though, in any case.

Fission-fusion hybrid reactor

A new thorium reactor concept?

Speculation alert:  It is a bad habit of mine to comment upon things I don't know beans about.  Hence the speculation alert.

On with my comment...

This seems unnecessary since the Thorium will transmute into an isotope of fissionable uranium.  So why do you need the fusion reaction?  It introduces a level of complexity that isn't needed.

The problem with fusion is that it uses more energy than it produces.  It will produce neutrons, and it can be used to transmute the Thorium, but the Thorium can do that by itself.  What problem does this solve?

It is a gas-cooled reaction, which is different from the molten-salt designs that are being developed.  ( I haven't kept up with these developments lately, so I don't know when a prototype will be available.  The goal was to have one in this decade.)

If a gas-cooled reactor is somehow better than a molten-salt one, then maybe that is the advantage.  But the article doesn't go into that.  It did mention that it is sub-critical, but so what?  Criticality is not what causes it to become dangerous in a molten-salt design.  The problem is with solid-fueled reactors that use water for cooling.  Molten-salt reactors solve that problem.

Thorium based molten-salt reactors have already had proof-of-concept testing way back in the seventies.  These tests did not use Thorium per se, but since Thorium only needs a neutron source to get it started, this is absolutely feasible.  Politics stopped this concept, it wasn't technical.

This elaborate design might be feasible, but the design has only been tested in computer simulations.  If it is feasible and can escape the politicians, then it could maybe work.

off-grid post 1.29.20

It has rained a lot this winter.  Actually, this isn't much of a winter.  Very mild, but
rainy.  It has given me a lot of practice with my water capture techniques.  Water filtration
has been practiced on other occasions.  As a matter of fact, the best system would be to
capture the water and then use a powered filtration system to clean the rainwater.  The
water that you can capture is still going to have dirt and whatnot in it.  It may also
have bad stuff in it, so it needs to be cleaner yet before it can be said to be potable.

A Berkey filtration system can take some water like that and finish the job.  For an extra
measure of safety, you can add some chemical treatment to it.  No need to get sick from
the water.

Therefore, if there's rain, I can capture "enough".

Trouble is, out there it can be very, very dry.  I need to check and see what kind of winter
they have had out there.  In the first three years, I watched this stuff like a hawk,
but in the last two or three winters, I have not watched it much at all.

Back to the weather:  it has rained so much out here this winter, I haven't any place to
put this water.  I don't have the filtration system in place, so mostly, I just dump
the water.  It seems like a terrible waste.  You learn to appreciate something you have
to work hard to obtain.

off-grid post, 1.26.20

There's not much posting here lately.  Well, here's a post to keep this blog going.

The off-grid project is a go.  In fact, the lack of posting is not an indication of quitting
the project.

I try to do a little bit every day.  Maybe that is exaggerating a bit, though.  I try to
plan a little every day. 

There are two plans for projects that are in the works, but like everything else, it is on
hold for now.  The ladder project has been in the planning stage for over a month.  The
current plan is to place it on the west side of the trailer, near the rear bumper.

I think that location is the best.  It shouldn't take this long to come to that conclusion,
but that is only because I don't spend enough time planning.

The other plan is a tentative one as well.  I have decided to revisit the Quonset concept.

I'd like to use concrete for the roof, but that is very heavy and messy stuff.  There are
tradeoffs for everything, though.  If I were to use a tarp again, it cannot be exposed to
the elements.  That means a square outer perimeter, with a sturdier exterior that can
withstand the elements.  Metal siding is a possibility.  There are other options.

Since it will need a sturdy exterior and a frame, why not use the tarp?  It doesn't have
to be a cattle panel either, but that is pretty strong stuff.  The problem with cattle-panel
for a ceiling is that it may move around.  It needs to be secured so that it doesn't move.

A possibility is to use insulation between the inner ceiling and the outer roof.  Also,
the sides can be insulated as well.  There's plenty of space for insulation and dead space.

Why use a Quonset at all?  It is the quickest and easiest way to get a roof up.  However,
that is not the way it went the last time.  It was largely because of the tarp, though. 
The wind blew it all over the place, and it was just about impossible to get that thing
on top of the cattle panel.  Once I did get it on there, it wasn't very straight nor
pretty.

Secondly, a Quonset wouldn't be necessary if I used the trailer. 

That is a whole different thing right there.  Which brings me back to the Quonset.

A trailer needs to be towed out there.  It needs a cover, which entails a construction
project of its own.  Of course, I've been planning that one too.

A move out there is not contemplated unless it becomes necessary.  At the time, I am in
good shape here.

I continue to practice living like I'm off-grid without actually being off-grid.  I can
expand upon that if I were to buy some solar panels and batteries.  For the time being, I
am minimizing energy expenditures.  From that info, I can calculate the minimum power
to run the trailer once it is on the property.  Batteries and solar panels are expensive.

Scientific American: Store Renewable Energy as Liquified Air

Scientific American: Store Renewable Energy as Liquified Air

Update:

Been there done that.  Uses too much energy, I suspect.


Comment:

This is an intriguing idea.  Instead of using a battery, atmospheric air is cooled to a liquid state.  When it warms, it expands enough to drive a turbine that can produce electricity.  It is claimed to be about 60 percent efficient.

Now if you were to use nuclear energy to liquefy the gas, you could have a plausible means of powering an auto or a vehicle.

Feasibility for this type of application depends upon how big of a tank is required to produce the needed power.

Focus fusion progress

Wefunder Campaign Extended to Mar. 1, X-rays Show: FF-2B's Best Shot is All Hot, Images Catch FF-2B in Action, New Video Series on Crisis in Cosmology

LPPFusion Report January 22, 2020 Summary: Wefunder Campaign Extended to March 1 X-rays Show: FF-2B's Best Shot is All Hot! Images Catch FF-2B in Action New Video Series on Crisis in Cosmology Wefunder Campaign Extended to March 1 We've just completed our third successful financial audit. Because of this we can now extend our Wefunder campaign through March 1st. Without this audit, SEC regulations limited us to ending the campaign 120 days after our fiscal year ended, which is Jan 31st. We are happy that we can stretch this campaign a little bit longer. So far, we've raised $395,000 from 165 investors. We need to raise only $5,000 more to reach our minimum goal of $400,000, but we hope to go way beyond this in our final month. Thanks to everyone who has invested or is considering doing so. X-rays Show: FF-2B's Best Shot is All Hot! The latest data from LPPFusion's lab shows that all the plasma in our tiny fusion plasmoid is hot, not just some of it. Hot in this case means 600 million degrees K, sixty times hotter than the center of the sun. This new result shows that our results are being fairly compared with those of other fusion approaches and that we really do have the hottest confined plasma in the fusion race. LPPFusion published in 2017 results that showed our device FF-1 had achieved the hottest confined ion energy of any fusion device—energy equivalent to a temperature of 2.8 billion K. However, some critics questioned if all the ions were this hot, or if there was a hidden background of cold plasma. In this alternative, a small number of hot ions in our plasmoid were colliding with a large number of cold ions to produce the fusion reactions we observed. So, critics argued, our record did not really reflect what was going on inside the plasmoid that produced the fusion reactions. (These critiques were never published, but were conveyed to us in conversations.) The new X-ray data that we analyzed this week rules out this cold-plasma idea. X-rays are emitted when hot electrons collide with any ions—hot or cold. So, the quantity of X-rays emitted measures the total number of ions (charged atoms) present in the plasmoid. At the exact same time, we are measuring the number of neutrons produced by fusion reactions, which are a measure of the number of hot ions. By measuring the ratio of neutrons to X-rays (and correcting for temperature and other factors) we can measure the ratio of the number of hot ions to the number of total ions. When we did this for our best shot so far this year, shot 1 of October 21, we found that while the neutrons showed 0.125 J (watt-sec) of fusion energy was released, only 0.035 J of X-rays energy was emitted. (See the graph—the big peak on the right is from the neutrons and the small peaks on the left are from the X-rays. The third peak from the left was produced when the fusion reactions took place. The horizontal axis is time in microseconds. Neutrons travel much slower than X-rays, so arrive at our instrument later.) Based on this ratio, we calculated that the number of hot ions is the same as the number of total ions, with a 15% error margin. So, at least for this shot, there's no room for cold plasma—it is all hot. We'll soon be doing the same analysis for all shots we take. Images Catch FF-2B in Action These new images from inside our Focus-Fusion-2B experimental device show the development of the filaments of current (bright thin parallel lines) in the early stages of each pulse. The filaments are a crucial step in compressing and heating the plasma to get fusion reactions. The images, taken with our ICCD camera using an exposure time of only 5 ns (billionths of a second) show the current sheath moving down the anode (towards upper right) as viewed between the cathode vanes (diagonal black bands). The top-to-bottom size of the images is 2.5 cm. They show the development of the sheath from 230-570 ns after the current starts flowing. So, the events are happening about 6 million times faster than you see them in this GIF. The key positive features of the images are that the filaments (running from lower left towards upper right) are evenly spaced and thin—only 200 microns in radius. Those characteristics should lead to a dense plasmoid and rapid fusion burn. But the images also show the challenge that we currently face—the front (right) edge of the sheath is not a single, sharp line, but two separated fronts. This is caused, we know, by the oscillation in current that produces an early small pulse of current, followed by a bigger one. In the region between the fronts the filaments are twisted and disorganized. This leads to poor compression and less fusion. However, we are working hard to eliminate the oscillations so there is a single front and the filaments will be neatly organized all the way to the front of the sheath. In the past three months, we have achieved significant progress in greatly reducing the oscillations, but have not yet reached the threshold for a new increase in yield. These images are produced from 10 separate, but very similar, shots. The flickers in brightness are caused by changes in camera filters and sensitivity—the real brightness is steadily increasing during the time covered as the current flowing through the sheath increases.

Boots and Oil Blog: What are magnons?

Boots and Oil Blog: What are magnons?: Good morning. This BECNF theory is on my mind this morning, so I'll start with that as my first post. I found the blog below in my qu...


I've seen a lot of clicks on the old cold fusion posts.  Here's a video that discusses Kim's BECNF theory.  It relies upon Bose-Einstein condensate ( BEC ) theory as a foundation for a theory on how cold fusion takes place.

Focus Fusion Report

lppfusion.com LPPFusion Report November 7, 2019 Summary: Wefunder Campaign Enters Home Stretch Light Elements Weigh in on Crisis in Cosmology Song Contest Winners! Fred Van Roessel 1937-2019 Note: This report is on LPPFusion developments outside our lab work. A separate report on lab development will follow next week. Wefunder Campaign Enters Home Stretch As we have reported to all investors and supporters, LPPFusion is again crowdfunding on the Wefunder website. Through the Wefunder site, anyone can now buy LPPFusion shares. We started this second campaign on Nov. 15, 2019 and now we are in the last two weeks, with the campaign ending Jan. 31, 2020. So far, we've raised $336,000 from 133 investors. We need to raise $64,000 more to reach our minimum goal of $400,000. We're confident we can do that with the help of new and old investors. This is your chance to help decide if and when fusion energy becomes reality. Humanity needs fusion to move forward. So far, LPPFusion has made the most progress towards achieving net energy for the least resources. With only $7 million invested, we have published peer-reviewed results thousands of times better than any other private fusion company. Our ratio of energy out to energy in is only 1/3 less than that achieved by JET, the most successful government fusion program—and they got that record back in 1997. Your investment, a minimum of $1,000 for 8 shares, will make more of a difference with LPPFusion than with any other fusion project. Our company valuation right now is only $38 million, so you will get the best bargain in fusion. For non-accredited investors, the Wefunder campaign is at present the only way to invest in LPPFusion. We realize that not everyone who wants to support our fusion effort can afford a $1,000 investment. For those who want to contribute, we will be initiating a major donation drive, with no minimum contribution, in February. We'll be announcing the details shortly. Our goal remains to raise $1 million from all sources as soon as possible. Share Tweet Forward to Friend Read Later Share Light Elements Weigh in on Crisis in Cosmology A bedrock prediction of the Big Bang theory has been contradicted by abundant observations, according to a new study by LPPFusion's Chief Scientist Eric Lerner which he presented Jan. 8 at the American Astronomical Society Meeting in Honolulu, deepening the already widely-discussed crisis in cosmology. The study looks at the origin and abundance of three key light elements that are hypothesized to have been created by the Big Bang. Precise amounts of helium, deuterium and lithium are predicted to have been formed by fusion reactions in the dense, extremely hot initial instants of the Big Bang. For both lithium and helium, the study shows, observations of abundances in old stars now differ from predictions by more than a dozen standard deviations and the gap has been widening at an accelerating pace. The oldest stars have less than half the helium and less than one tenth the lithium than that predicted by Big Bang Nucleosynthesis theory. The lowest lithium levels observed are less than 1% that predicted by the theory. Indeed, the evidence is consistent with no helium or lithium having been formed before the first stars in our galaxy. Li vs Fe abundance for the 26 known dwarf stars with Fe/H<10 ppb. These are the oldest stars, with the least contamination from earlier stars. Dark blue dots are measured values, red dots are Li upper limits and light blue dots are Li and Fe upper limits. The BBN predicted range of values is shown by the red solid lines. Equally important, the study shows that the right amounts of these light elements have been predicted by an alternative explanation, which hypothesizes that these elements were produced by stars in the earliest stages of the evolution of galaxies. This alternative explanation, which Lerner calls the Galactic Origin of Light Elements or GOLE hypothesis, derives from theoretical expectations that the first generation of stars to form in a galaxy are intermediate-mass stars that are from 4 to 12 times as massive as the sun. These stars burn hydrogen to helium in tens to a couple of hundred million years, much faster than our sun's burn rate of ten billion years. The helium then disperses in powerful stellar winds during the late stages of these stars' lifetimes. Cosmic rays from these early stars, colliding at high energy with other nuclei, produce deuterium and lithium. Lerner's new work was covered in a number of news reports including the online magazine Inverse, Futurism, Courthouse News Service, and Space Daily. The science website "See the Pattern" posted Dec. 21 a new hour-long illustrated interview with Lerner discussing the relationship between the companies' fusion research efforts and his research in cosmology. The physical theories that guide the development of the plasma focus device for fusion experiments arose from studies by Lerner and others of quasars, the giant explosions deep in space. The tiny plasmoids in the device, where the fusion reactions take place, are in essence ultra-scaled-down versions of quasars. So, instead of a "star in a bottle" our fusion device is more a "quasar in a bottle". Lerner's research in fusion and in cosmology have been closely linked for decades. In addition to the quasar work, Lerner performed calculations about the origin of the large-scale structure of the universe, based on the properties of plasma filamentation—an instability that generates tornadoes of electric current and magnetic fields on all scales. On the cosmology side, these calculations, together with observations of giant superclusters of galaxies, showed that the largest structures must have taken hundreds of billions of years to form, far longer than the time available since the hypothetical Big Bang, so this was strong evidence against the Big Bang theory. On the fusion side, quantitative understanding of these filaments, which form on a tiny scale in the plasma focus device, allowed solid predictions of how the device would work best. Many of the conflicts between Big Bang theory and observations that are emphasized in the new study have been known for some time, especially the "lithium problem". But most cosmologists have dismissed them as "anomalies" in an otherwise sound Big Bang "concordance cosmology" theory. On the contrary, Lerner contends that the light elements results join the better-known Hubble-constant and closed-universe problems in a long list of contradictions between Big Bang theory and observations. "The Big Bang should have resulted in the annihilation of matter and antimatter, leaving a surviving density of matter that would be a hundred billion times less than that observed," Lerner points out. "To avoid that outcome, Big Bang theory requires an asymmetry of matter and antimatter with consequences, such as the decay of the proton, which have been contradicted by extensive experiments. In addition, an expanding universe should lead to declines in the surface brightness of distant galaxies—but those have not been observed either, as I and my colleagues have shown in published papers. The list of contradictions goes on and on. For cosmology to advance, the basic hypothesis of the Big Bang has to be abandoned. The real crisis in cosmology is that the Big Bang never happened." Technical background on the new study and on the other problems with Big Bang theory is available here. Share Tweet Forward to Friend Read Later Share Fusion Song Winners! The votes, all 63 of them, are in and we have our winners in our Fusion Song Parody contest. First Prize, with 24 votes to "Fusion for Everyone" written by 2-time contest winner and still champion, Gregory N. Ranky! Second Prize, with 16 votes, to "Age of Beryllium" written by Chief Scientist Eric Lerner. Third Prize, with 9 votes, to "Cone with US" by Matei Victor. Rest of the votes, 14 total, to the other contestants: "Plasmoid Song" and "Focus Fusion Anthem" by Lerner and "FoFu, FoFu" by Mike Muller. Congratulations to all! Next step: Can anyone who sings well and someone who plays an instrument get together and record one of the winners in a video? Might be fun and get us a bit of notice!