An interesting dynamic in slowed domestic beef production. And a twofer on increasing efficiency in combustion heating appliances: no, electrification is not our sole savior.
Two things for you to know about beef production (quoted from Mrs. Gabel's op ed linked below):
"...the Jan. 1 beef cow herd of 28.9 million head is the smallest since 1962. Peel [Oklahoma State University economist Derrell Peel] said he expects the numbers to be even lower at the beginning of the new year."
"Rebuilding the nation’s cowherd isn’t a fast process, especially compared to the amount of time required to increase the supply of chickens or hogs, for example. Cattle producers will have to retain more replacement females and sell fewer cows."
The nation's beef cow herd is down, which effectively means that the supply of beef will be down (and, as Mrs. Gabel correctly notes) the prices will likely come up and/or consumers may move to imports.
The thing that was interesting to me, the reason I wanted to post on it was the "doubled-edged" problem a small national beef herd presents.
There is the fact that fewer cattle will make it to market. That's pretty self-explanatory.
But there's also the fact (and this is something that you may not be aware of it you're not too familiar with the business like yours truly), that in order to increase supply, you'll have to hold back yet more FEMALE cows as breeding stock.
It makes sense if you think about it: cows don't get stamped out at a factory after all. I'll be damned if I would have ever thought of it myself though.
There are more interesting details about the cattle business in the op ed below which I recommend you take a second to read.
Upshot looks to be that prices for beef will be headed up for a couple years though. Throw that price increase on the pile I suppose.
I also hope that a fair portion of that increase makes it to producers. From those that I've talked to, it seems that the increases in beef prices don't always make it all the way down to the producers.
https://www.coloradopolitics.com/opinion/americas-beef-production-pickle-gabel/article_97de444c-6fd0-11ee-86b0-179e4804f506.html
Efficient heating with lower emissions need not be electric. Electrification as the sole savior is just the current narrative.
I wrote a post earlier where I made an analogy between policy and a thermostat (see screenshot 1 as a reminder).
The behavior I pointed to was that many current appliances (oven, furnace) that run at constant output do not just hit their setpoint, level off, and stay there.
The reason is two fold:
1. Older appliances are binary: they're on or they're off with nothing between. They also only run at full power.
2. There is always carryover, thermal "momentum". That is, when your oven's thermostat registers, say, 350, it shuts off the coil. The coil still has a high temperature and that leftover heat continues to go into the oven, raising the temp above 350. Temp peaks, falls back, and when the oven's temp goes below 350, the thermostat tells the coil to start again. Coils don't heat instantaneously, thus it's going to take a bit for it to catch up. So you go below the setpoint and start riding the wave up again.
To counter the idea that only electrification can result in fewer emissions and less fossil fuel use, I wanted to return to this topic as a good jumping-off point for a discussion of advances in efficiency for combustion-powered heating.
You see, modern combustion-powered heat sources are not like they were in the past. Nor are the controls like they were.
In order to keep this more manageable, and also in recognition that we all have differing tolerances for (and interests in) technical detail, I abstracted out the various details into screenshots which I will mention as I go. The technical detail will still be around the level of a layman, so if you're feeling zippy, give it a look. It’s in a gallery at the end of this text.
I also chose boilers to be the main topic because it's the heat I have and thus it's an interest. It's also a method of heating large spaces and the efficiencies I mention are scale-able. FYI: understand that similar advances and dynamics happen with forced-air (furnace) systems too. If that's of interest google the term "condensing furnace" to learn more.
Knowing what you now know about thermostats and thermal "momentum" I hope that it makes sense that one of the first improvements we could make to improve the efficiency of a boiler would be to have it able to better match the heating loads (the amount of heat needed for any given building and/or weather condition) it faces. That is, make it what's called modulated.
After all, how good a mileage could you expect from your car if you drove everywhere at full throttle?
These boilers are actually on the market right now, the technology is pretty well proven and understood (albeit with some updates to design and operation). See the screenshot "Technical Detail 1".
Modern boilers can ramp up and down in their heat output to match the load we put on them. Take a look at screenshot 2 attached for a picture representation. On very cold days, the boiler gives all it can to maintain your house at a given temp, while on milder days it can "slow down" and output less heat, operating more efficiently.
A quick note on the sawtooth pattern at the right of the graph. All devices have limits and modulating boilers are no exception. No boiler lower its output all the way to zero. At some point it will have to start cycling on and off. The theoretical boiler in screenshot 2 has to do this when it gets to about 20% of its max output.
Another way to boost efficiency would be to try and wring as much heat out of the circulating hot water in the system as possible before it gets back to the boiler. It's obviously a waste to have the water circulating all the way back to the heat source with any heat left right?
Additionally, you could get more efficiency by looking for ways to limit the amount of waste heat that goes up the flue.
There is a problem here, however. There is more detail in "Technical Detail 2" attached, but, in brief, older boilers have a definite upper limit on efficiency (about 85%--you get 85 units of heat to the water for every 100 units of combustion energy in). This is a reflection of the fact that they cannot wring all the heat out of their exhaust nor have water come back below a minimum temperature.
As before, modern boiler design has figured a way around these problems, getting efficiencies in the high 90's*. The way they do it is by leveraging the tremendous boost in heat energy you get when you condense water out of air. There's more detail in "Technical Detail 3" if you'd like, but I can give you a sense of things pretty quickly here.
When you heat water, it requires energy. When you take and boil water off to steam, it requires energy. Reversing either process (drawing heat from water or letting water vapor condense back to droplets) does the opposite; it gives energy.
The two are not equal, however. In fact, you get 538 times the energy returned when you turn 1 kg of steam to water as opposed to cooling that same 1 kg of water by 1 degree. 538 times is a gigantic increase in energy if you can figure how to safely capitalize on it! We can. Again, this is existing and well known technology.
Let's wrap up.
Electrification is not the only way for us to provide heat in an efficient manner. Combustion technology that is currently available can do so, and often with existing parts and appliances.
It will require extra money to do it of course, but I want you to think through the costs associated with replacing an older boiler (with a modern modulating/condensing boiler) as compared with electrification.
Think about what needs to be replaced vs. what wouldn't for each.** Now think about what would need to be added.
The gas line is there. The piping and radiators are there. The sizes of the units is not substantially different so no new building infrastructure needs be done.
Compare this a heat pump. A number of things need to be reconsidered and/or redone. What do you do with the old hydronic system which has been built into the structure? Where and how do you run the lines for the heat pump? What about updates to the electrical service?
We live in a climate with winters. Heat pumps could offer us some leverage on energy during the very mild periods of Spring and Fall. They are effectively electric heaters come deepest darkest winter, however. Multiple commercial buildings and homes drawing highly on the grid, especially a grid that people have envisioned as running on renewables, in Winter is likely to result in some problems.
A gas-fired, high-efficiency boiler can tailor its output to conditions maximizing its efficiency AND it can provide dependable heat in deepest darkest Winter without a drain on our electrical grid.
Yes indeed we should be reducing our emissions and consumption of fossil fuels (particularly non-domestic sourced ones), but I advocate for a thoughtful approach. One that takes small, achievable steps with current technology and keeps its eye out for better things in the future.
Not (I repeat NOT) a blind leap into unknown and unproven as our current policy has it.
*An important caveat: Note that the efficiency of any boiler (older, newer, modulating, condensing) decreases as you put more load on it. Just like heat pumps and, probably, any other heating appliance. See "Technical Detail 4".
**Again, fairness dictates a caveat: there is a limit to how far you can jerry rig a boiler system. Some cases would require a more money than others. I still hold that a complete change in heating system is more, but it is important to remember that no choice is without cost.
PID's: an improvement in controls.
Bear with me because I felt a need to touch on something related to the previous post. It is surprisingly intuitive though the words used to describe it are somewhat intimidating.
This post might be a bit of a stretch for you, but a good stretch every so often feels good and keeps you flexible.
I welcome questions if you have any and will try my best. I should also say that this is written for a lay audience and thus there are some subtleties that I will ignore/miss with the intent of making it easier for people who didn't take calculus to understand. Set your expectations accordingly if you're a controls person and allow me some grace.
In researching the post right prior to this one, the subject of PID controllers came up. That is, proportional, integral, and derivative (PID) controllers.
They have uses in heating and cooling (hence finding them in research), but their use goes beyond that field.
Let's step back quickly to talk about controls. I'm going to make an analogy to cooking because you may not realize it, but there are many facets of life where you, the human in the process, are the control.
Think about the last time you cooked an egg on the stove. Think of the senses you used to tell when that egg was done to your liking.
You heated the skillet and maybe listened for when the butter just started to sizzle (foaming started to taper). You know you're close when the foaming dies down and the sizzle sound is picking up.
After cracking the egg in the pan, the white around the yolk (checking whether its clear or opaque) gives a good sense of whether the egg is close to done or not.
If you look at the clock and the egg is starting to get brown at the edges way too soon, you turn down the heat so you don't burn it.
My point is that you took in information from various senses and then integrated that info in your brain to arrive at a picture that told you "the egg is proceeding well and should be done soon".
Now imagine that you wanted to give this job to a robot. You would have to figure out not just the rudimentary movements required to get an egg over heat and on a plate, you'd have to figure out how to help the robot KNOW the egg's process and when to stop cooking it.
Keeping things simple, let's say that you had the robot use a temperature probe to check the temperature of the egg every 2 seconds and pull it when it hits 170 (about the point at which the white congeals). A lot of binary controls do this. Simple measurements and simple instructions.
Would that result in a consistently delicious meal, however?
As anyone who's ever made something like caramel, hollandaise, or something similar can tell you, it ain't always just the temperature. Sometimes it's the rate. You can, if you're not careful, overshoot the mark and end up with burnt sugar or a greasy broken mess of scrambled egg and butter.
That is, merely telling your robot to pull the egg at 170 could result in something inedible: maybe the egg hits 170 degrees in 3 seconds ... and was heating so quickly that it overshoots and ends up burned.
You need, in other words, some data on where the egg was was and where it's headed to get a fuller picture.
That's what you get with a PID controller. It does give you a proportional measure. It samples and tells you where you are relative to what you want.
It goes further though. To get a complete sense, we'd need to go into calculus, but I can give you a non-technical idea of what's happening (and some calculus vocab to wow people at your next dinner party).
In the calculus sense, if you hear the word integral, I want you to think a sum, a total, a "history". If you hear the word derivative I want you to think a slope, a speed, a rate of change.
A PID controller indeed tells you the current state of things, but the integral branch takes a sum over time to give you a sense of the road behind you. If you are far far away from your setpoint and not getting there anytime soon, the I branch tells you to fix that by trying to get there faster.
The derivative branch by contrast tells you how quickly things are changing. If speed (another kind of derivative) tells you how quickly you're changing where you are, the derivative branch in a PID tells you to slow down or speed up because it gives a sense of how quickly things are piling up or "moving". I.e., if you're close to your set point, slow down so you won't overshoot.
PID controllers are, thanks to the power, robustness, and low cost of computers/solid-state electronics popping up everywhere. They're in heating/cooling systems**, in manufacturing, and in chemical process controllers to name a few. They are an advance that we have now and are quickly building up some knowledge base in using.
Paired with the right equipment, they are a way that we can wring more efficiency from things that we already know how to use.
The video linked below was, I thought, a neat one because it gives a good intro to how a PID controller works.
If you watch it, pay attention to the pointer's behavior as the man adjusts the various amounts of proportional control you have vs. integral control vs. derivative control. Then go back and re-read.
**The big application and use here being that, with a PID controller properly set up and the equipment to match it, your heating and cooling system can start to taper as it approaches the set point which keeps you much closer to the temperature you want with less wasted energy. See the post prior to this one.