191
Scientist Discover How to Convert CO2 into Powder That Can Be Stored for Decades
(www.scientificamerican.com)
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Here is the paper the article is based on
It is very chemistry dense that is way overy head. It says that "typical" electrolysis techniques have around a 10% "carbon efficiency", whatever that means, while this one has around 96%.
I also see that in their test they used CO2 gas, so this may efficiently get us a usable fuel from CO2 but may not help us sequester CO2 gas from the atmosphere.
I'd love someone who knows what they are talking about to analyze it for us though.
The sell of the paper is a new fuel storage medium. The positive part is that creating a fuel from existing carbon sources means (hopefully) less petroleum pumped out of the ground to contribute more carbon. The negative is that it leans more to that than the permanent sequestering, and I can't seem to pick out a net energy use anywhere, but basic physics tells us it will take more energy to do the process in entirety, even if most of it results in large scale storage. I doubt that happens because removal of carbon vs. putting into a new form to be used is like burying money. Which leads to something I've noticed pop up only in the past month or so...a new term added. "Carbon capture, utililization, and storage". CCS has already been very heavily into the production of carbon products to support their efforts, after all they have to make a profit, right? The only real storage done is a product to inject into the ground to help retrieve more oil. Again, they aren't going to just bury the money, that's foolhardy for a business.
Sorry for more negativity in the thread. Just calling a spade a spade. Those who don't like the feeling that gives can just ignore it and focus on the new science that will save us.
No, I agree. Capitalism is a flawed creation that is ingrongruent with continuing to survive on this planet.
Only carbon sequestration I can imagine is if the government taxes corporations and pays others to bury carbon.