Friday, September 23, 2016

Approximate Global Market Values for Insulation Materials

An extensive Internet search was made to identify market values for materials used in insulation.  This table provides approximate amounts for six materials used in insulation:
                                              
Table  2015 Global Market Values for Six Materials Used in Insulation
glass wool
 $   14,000,000,000
33%
eps polystyrene
 $   13,000,000,000
31%
mineral wool
 $     8,000,000,000
19%
polyurethane
 $     4,200,000,000
10%
xps polystyrene
 $     2,500,000,000
6%
aerogel
 $        300,000,000
1%
total
 $   42,000,000,000
100%


The amounts include not just insulation used in buildings but also in industrial, HVAC, appliance, and other applications.  The amounts represent 2015 values.  Other materials are also used in insulation, such as cellulose, but the values of these could not be found.   The values of these other materials are believed to be small in comparison to values in the table.


The efficient and effective use of insulation materials is considered to be a very important need (tool) in reducing energy use and in combating global warming.  Estimates can be found on expected annual increases for these insulation materials.

Thursday, September 8, 2016

Natural Gas Pipeline and Consumption – US versus EU

Table 1 below shows some natural gas pipeline data for the northeast (NE) region of the United States (US), along with demographic and geographic data.  Table 2 shows such data for the European Union (EU).  The US natural gas data was obtained from the US Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration (EIA) website.  Click here to go an EIA page that provides natural gas pipeline mileage data and click here to go to an EIA site from which natural gas consumption by state data can be found.

The EU natural gas pipeline and consumption data were obtained from data provided by Eurogas, an association representing the European natural gas industry.  Click here and here for data on EU natural gas pipeline length and on EU natural gas consumption data.

What I think makes this data useful in comparing natural gas usage between the US’s NE region (those states in Table 1) and the EU is the closeness of the population densities for each area (309 people per square mile for the NE region; 304 for the EU).  This being the case, I assume some value in natural gas pipeline delivery and consumption comparisons between the two areas.

The Tables suggest to me that natural gas pipeline delivery and consumption in the US NE region is much different than in the EU, even though the population densities are very close.  Natural gas consumption per person in the NE region is much greater than in the EU (74,700 cubic feet per person versus 29,632 cubic feet per person).

Also interesting is that far less pipeline appears to be used in the NE region; even as the amount of per person gas consumption is much higher.  For example, in the NE region 0.10 miles of pipeline per square mile is present versus 0.80 miles per square mile in the EU.  Many more persons per pipeline mile are in the NE region (3,132) than in the EU (382).  This pipeline difference would seem to suggest that pipeline use in the NE region is more efficient and productive than in the EU.


Table 1 NE region USA
pop. million
area square miles
pop. density person per square mile
miles of natural gas pipeline
natural gas consumpt. billion cu ft
natural gas cu ft used per person
natural gas cu ft used per square mile
miles natural gas pipeline per square mile
persons per mile pipeline
CT
3.60
5,500
655
628
235.9
65,528
42.9 M
0.11
5732
MA
6.70
10,600
632
972
420.2
62,716
39.6 M
0.09
6893
ME
1.30
35,200
37
609
60.7
46,692
1.7 M
0.02
2,135
NH
1.30
9,300
140
291
57.0
43,846
6.1 M
0.03
4,467
NJ
8.90
8,700
1,023
1,520
766.4
86,112
88.1 M
0.17
5,855
NY
19.70
54,600
361
5,018
1,344.9
68,269
24.6 M
0.09
3,926
PA
12.80
46,100
278
8,680
1,200.7
93,805
26.0 M
0.19
1,475
RI
1.10
1,500
733
100
88.7
80,636
59.1 M
0.07
11,000
VT
0.63
9,600
65
71
10.7
17,065
1.1 M
0.01
8,831
region's total
56.03
181,100

17,889
4,185.2




region's amount


309


74,700
23.1 M
0.10
3,132
Table 2
pop. million
area square miles million
pop. density person per square mile
miles of natural gas pipeline million
natural gas consumpt. billion cu ft
natural gas cu ft used per person
natural gas cu ft used per square mile
miles natural gas pipeline per square mile
persons per mile pipeline
EU
508
1.67
304
1.329
15,053
29,632
9 M
0.80
382

Monday, September 5, 2016

Chemical and Material Shortage Alert – August 2016

The purpose of this blog is to identify chemical and material shortages reported on the Internet.  The sources of the information reported here are primarily news releases issued on the Internet.  The issue period of the news releases is August 2016.

Section I below lists those chemicals and materials that were on the previous month’s Chemical and Material Shortage Alert list and continue to have news releases indicating they are in short supply. Click here to read the July 2016 Chemical and Material Shortage Alert list.

Section II lists the new chemicals and materials (not on the July alert).  Also provided is some explanation for the shortage and geographical information.  This blog attempts to list only actual shortage situations – those shortages that are being experienced during the period covered by the news releases.  Chemicals and materials identified in news releases as only being in danger of being in short supply status are not listed.

Section I.   Nickel:  global; mining not keeping up with demand
       Zinc:  global; mining not keeping up with demand

Section II.   Shortages Reported in August not found on the Previous Month’s List

Propylene: Europe; supply not keeping up with demand

Reasons for Section II shortages can be broadly categorized as: 

1.  Mining not keeping up with demand: none
2.  Production not keeping up with demand: none
3.  Government regulations: none
4.  Sources no longer available: none
5.  Insufficient imports:  none
6.  Supply not keeping up with demand:  propylene