Petrol from fresh air

[sooey]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...t-in-fight-against-energy-crisis-8217382.html

Great stuff, but what are we going to breathe?

 

[joinerjohn]

Seems an extremely expensive way of making petrol though. They might wait until it reaches £20 a gallon (next year then) until it becomes a viable product.

 

[calorific]

Seems an extremely expensive way of making petrol though. They might wait until it reaches £20 a gallon (next year then) until it becomes a viable product.

I'm on fleabay now buying a load of jerry cans in readiness

 

[maltaron]

So its OK to remove all the "greenhouse gases" from the air. Then how are trees and plants to survive, then need CO2 to produce the oxygen we breath.

 

[Space cat]

A small British company has produced the first "petrol from air" using a revolutionary technology that promises to solve the energy crisis as well as helping to curb global warming by removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Air Fuel Synthesis in Stockton-on-Tees has produced five litres of petrol since August when it switched on a small refinery that manufactures gasoline from carbon dioxide and water vapour.

(My bold text.)

It would appear that ignorance of elementary science has reached the national press.

As every schoolboy (and probably most girls too) used to be taught, the chemical reaction CO2 + 4H2 = CH4 +2H2O can be used to make methane which, if so desired, can then be polymerised into more complex hydrocarbons like petrol. The key ingredient is of course hydrogen and not water vapour as stated in the article. So where does this hydrogen come from? Answer: from water. And how do we get it out? By adding energy; at least as much energy as you can possibly get back from the petrol. And where does the energy come from?

Reading further down, we find that the electricity needed to produce this 'petrol from air' is to be derived from renewables. Now that might sound fair enough but, for as long as any power station anywhere on the grid is still burning fossil fuel, using a renewable power source to make a fossil fuel is pointless. By feeding the renewable source into the grid, you can save enough fossil fuel to make at least 2.5 times as much petrol.

Some time in the future when all of the fossil fuel has gone - or is considered politically unacceptable - our power stations will all be nuclear. (My apologies to those who advocate a solar future but I think it will be nuclear.) Only then will it make sense to use some of that electricity to make petrol.

Addendum:

There are perhaps some special cases. Maybe you're in a remote location with no easy access to petrol and no connection to the grid but you do have a wind turbine.

 

[big-all]

So its OK to remove all the "greenhouse gases" from the air. Then how are trees and plants to survive, then need CO2 to produce the oxygen we breath.

i think removing all the co2 will only apply to the 0.00001% of the atmosphere they manage to process

 

[Space cat]

Then how are trees and plants to survive, then need CO2 to produce the oxygen we breath.

You get the CO2 back when you burn the petrol.

 

[ladylola]

The one key element in this or any energy crisis is always pretty much ignored and that is levels of consumption. To provide a "solution" involves at worst not raising consumption and better still reducing it, we have higher levels of energy production now than we did 30 or 60 years ago and we have a crisis looming now .

 

[ImayKnow]

What you may not realise is that any alternative fuel to petrol or diesel will still attract the same level of taxation that applies to these fuels.

So the average man in the street will be no better off.

 

[r.bartlett]

The one key element in this or any energy crisis is always pretty much ignored and that is levels of consumption. To provide a "solution" involves at worst not raising consumption and better still reducing it, we have higher levels of energy production now than we did 30 or 60 years ago and we have a crisis looming now .

Reducing consumption means either turning things off or increasing efficiency. There was a massive hoo ha when std 100w bulbs were banned but that was needed to force the improvement of led both for quality and price. IE a market had to be made in order for the led manufacturers compete. This is what governments do best. Enforce change despite the fuss. They don't get it right very often but in a few years when everybody has gen 10+ lamps there will be no fond memories of filament bulbs

Where they are getting it wrong is 20 years ago there should enforced government assisted insulation upgrades to all homes below a certain energy rating to bring them within acceptable limits. No opt out allowed. All UK homes must comply irrespective of size or age.

Those who refuse will have their homes reassessed and their rates will go up accordingly (ie the cost of not complying)

Our home build quality is dreadful. I remember driving to work a way back and watching a drive through car wash and further on a block of flats being built.
The car wash had 100mm blue celotex in the walls and the flats cheap 50mm fibreglass...

 

[gregers]

bet this doesn't go into fruition.
bet the idea is suddenly found not to work,i:e has been bought up by the oil industry and then locked away.
like all the other so called ideas of this and that being an alternative fuel,suddenly disappears from view.

the Arab states set the price of crude along with the speculators ,but its the oil producing countrys that set the amount released.

apart from the oil fields that haven't been found yet,i wouldn't be surprised when in about a few hundred years when oil gets a little tight America will suddenly be awash with the stuff.

 

[joinerjohn]

Where they are getting it wrong is 20 years ago there should enforced government assisted insulation upgrades to all homes below a certain energy rating to bring them within acceptable limits. No opt out allowed. All UK homes must comply irrespective of size or age.

Those who refuse will have their homes reassessed and their rates will go

Just what would people who live in Grade 2 or even 1 listed buildings have done? Just pay out higher council tax? Higher rates?
You could never have a situation where people can't opt out of insulating their house... What about those who live in Victorian and Georgian terraced houses , with solid walls (no cavity for starters?) ?? Do you force them to reduce the size of their rooms by 200mm by adding insulation to their external walls?
If so, where does it end? Let the government ride roughshod over everyone? Let them direct every waking moment of our hours/days/lives??

 

[JBR]

All this procrastinating about where to get our energy from! Mark my words, like it or not the future is nuclear.

Now let's get on with it. Build more nuclear power stations before it's too late.

 

[JOHNBOY42]

bet this doesn't go into fruition.
bet the idea is suddenly found not to work,i:e has been bought up by the oil industry and then locked away.
like all the other so called ideas of this and that being an alternative fuel,suddenly disappears from view.

the Arab states set the price of crude along with the speculators ,but its the oil producing countrys that set the amount released.

apart from the oil fields that haven't been found yet,i wouldn't be surprised when in about a few hundred years when oil gets a little tight America will suddenly be awash with the stuff.

It wont be in a couple of hundred years....this will come about in the next 40 years

 

[JOHNBOY42]

All this procrastinating about where to get our energy from! Mark my words, like it or not the future is nuclear.

Now let's get on with it. Build more nuclear power stations before it's too late.

Got to agree with you. I dont like the thought of it but our options are fading fast and nuclear is the way froward