245
votes
Accepted
Are there logical gaps in the periodic table in which you could insert a new mystery element for use as a fuel?
No
As we currently understand physical chemistry, all possible elements are known below whatever the state of the art number is now (Oganesson - Element 118).
The atomic number of an element (the ...
- 28.6k
40
votes
Plausibility of a car running on noble gasses
Noble gasses are called "noble" because they don't interact with other elements (same way as nobility of the past didn't mix up with lower classes).
Since the entire concept of combustion ...
- 266k
31
votes
Accepted
If Mars contains coal, will it become a dominant source of energy?
Burning fossil fuels on Mars is highly impractical. Burning coal means using up oxygen, which is not readily available on Mars. As long as the human population on Mars has to live in environmentally ...
- 2,828
30
votes
What energy sources would a species use if they didn't have access to fossil fuels?
Wood
You said they don't have access to fossil fuels, but not to a forest. Using wood as fuel can be a good way to start gathering energy, in form of steam engine if you are looking for mechanical ...
- 8,803
29
votes
Alternative source of fuel instead of wood
Fish and whale oils
They have been commonly used by many cultures across history for many purposes. If your people live on an island, I would be inclined to think that they would have access to fish ...
- 6,981
29
votes
Accepted
What would a spacefaring race use as fuel for their matter-to-energy reactors?
Mine tailings:
In your scenario, you can destroy matter. But even waste materials for your civilization out in space are made of the things you find valuable. In space, people are interested in places ...
- 62.9k
27
votes
Alternative source of fuel instead of wood
Fallen tree limbs, dry leaves, pine cones, twigs -- "woody debris" in general. If they aren't managing their forests, they're going to be full of debris which will just pile up and make the place ...
- 6,452
22
votes
Alternative source of fuel instead of wood
Do they have grasslands?
Then animal dung is used in a number of locations around the world. According to wiki, the places it has been used are: Asia, Europe, and the Americas.
- 19.7k
22
votes
Plausibility of a car running on noble gasses
You need a new technology
I assume you've chosen noble gasses because they're completely unreactive. The flip side of that is that they would release a lot of energy, if they were somehow in the ...
- 21.6k
21
votes
Accepted
Refueling from stars
Depending on the density of fuel you are looking for, exactly what fuel you need, and how protected you are from heat and radiation, I would say your best bets for refueling a fusion-powered ...
- 603
19
votes
Are there logical gaps in the periodic table in which you could insert a new mystery element for use as a fuel?
Short answer: No.
Elements are identified by their atomic number, i.e. the number of protons in the nucleus.
When Mendeleev invented the periodic table, there were a number of holes. For example, ...
- 14.4k
19
votes
Would aliens use the same fuel as us, if not what would they use?
Chemistry and physics are the same all across the universe, therefore chemically propelled rockets will experience the same limitations as we see on Earth. Even the chemistry behind the propellants ...
- 266k
19
votes
What would a spacefaring race use as fuel for their matter-to-energy reactors?
Solar Wind
Converting Mass to Energy creates such a crazy amount of energy that you barely need any mass. One kilogram of matter has ~ 25,000 Gigawatt-hours of energy. Since a normal US house uses 10,...
- 9,958
18
votes
Refueling from stars
is the pull the same if you're going for a particular density of matter?
Yes, gravity works on mass not volume
The only materials you would be able to reach would be those emitted from the star. ...
- 20.4k
16
votes
Alternative source of fuel instead of wood
If you're on the island of Ireland, the answer is peat. Many parts of Britain used it as fuel too. Of course this requires the landscape to be substantially peat bog rather than all forest, but if it'...
- 19.7k
15
votes
Mobile Post-Apocalypse Shelter
Gasoline Has an Expiration Date
Gasoline lasts about 6 months, or at-least it DID. Now that we add ethanol to it gasoline only has an official storage life of about 90 days. Treatments can be added ...
- 20.9k
14
votes
What energy sources would a species use if they didn't have access to fossil fuels?
Poop! Poop! And more Poop!
But seriously, dried animal dung is a very common fuel, even today in some places.
You can burn it like wood.
Dry dung fuel (or dry manure fuel) is animal feces that ...
- 20.2k
14
votes
Accepted
Would aliens use the same fuel as us, if not what would they use?
The chemical propellants in common use today (kerosene/oxygen, hydrogen/oxygen, methane/oxygen rising fast, plus variations on hydrazine and nitrogen oxides for storable hypergolics) are dictated by ...
- 45.3k
13
votes
Accepted
Are the petroleum deposits correlated to the dinosaurs extintion?
The short answer is, it wouldn't make a difference. The biggest reason is the sheer amount of biomass involved. With think of dinosaurs as pretty big, but in terms of total mass, they're peanuts ...
- 35.9k
13
votes
Alternative source of fuel instead of wood
Coal
Have them use coal. The Aztecs used it, the ancient Chinese used it, the Romans used it. They can find surface deposits or dig rudimentary bell pits. Bronze Age tech is more than enough to mine ...
- 17.8k
13
votes
What would a spacefaring race use as fuel for their matter-to-energy reactors?
First it might be a good idea to ballpark how much matter you would need. From Newtonian physics it takes about $62$ megajoules of energy to get a kilogram completely off planet earth, so 2 kilos ...
- 2,013
12
votes
Spaceship fuel on Europa
Under the ice:
Under the ice on Europa, there is... more ice. The upper layer of the planet is actually a solid ice layer, similar to the upper mantle of the Earth. While solid, there is a lot of ...
- 3,868
11
votes
How to explain lack of fosil fuels on an Earth-like exoplanet?
Mass extinctions have nothing to do with large oil deposits, unlike at least 2 answers have said it does.
Oil accumulates largely due to vegetation and aquatic life forms dying and their carbon/...
- 6,588
11
votes
The Fate of Coal Factories in a Life After People
Automated loss-of-fuel shutdown - not very exciting
For coal powered plants, pulverized coal is fed from hoppers into the furnace. Human operator action is required to switch between hopper feed ...
- 85k
11
votes
Can a secondary fuel economy ever be hardened against attacks?
Most fuel cells don't take raw hydrogen, but hydrogen containing compound like hydrocarbons on hydrides. This means, you will still be using natural gas in your hydrogen economy, simply to a much ...
- 11.9k
11
votes
Accepted
How would modern naval warfare be altered by a complete lack of fossil fuels?
'Fossil' fuels are still produced
Not all fossil fuels come from fossils. Things like sunflower oil habe great potential. You can already use it to mix with diesel, though highly illegal in most ...
- 32.2k
11
votes
Accepted
Fuel for vehicles in an abruptly abandoned world
The book The Knowledge: How to Rebuild Our World from Scratch by Lewis Dartnell should be a very informative read for you. It covers what one should do in your setting in great detail.
At least, in ...
- 17k
10
votes
Are there logical gaps in the periodic table in which you could insert a new mystery element for use as a fuel?
People have already covered the parts of the question about the periodic table so I'd like to just talk about one of the side-conditions for a moment.
The two desired properties of renewable and ...
- 2,535
10
votes
What would a spacefaring race use as fuel for their matter-to-energy reactors?
Waste.
Landfill sites are expensive to set-up properly. The sites can eventually have housing built on them, but not without extensive plumbing to allow methane and noxious gasses to escape safely. ...
- 23.8k
9
votes
Refueling from stars
That obviously depends on the tech level you have available in your story. An extremely advanced civilization would probably find more efficient ways of producing energy long before figuring out how ...
- 199
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible