Posted on 12/10/2012 6:25:50 AM PST by docbnj
A simple new method has been shown to remove carbon-dioxide emissions from power plant exhaust while consuming half the energy needed by the best existing carbon-capture approach. Testing of the technology, which uses cheap limestone-derived material to trap carbon dioxide, has been underway at two different megawatt-scale pilot plants in Spain and Germany.
(Excerpt) Read more at technologyreview.com ...
If the U.S. federal government can’t extort fines from utilities in a carbon tax in order for Democrats to buy votes from its Free Stuff constituency, it is not interested. It never has been about the environment. It’s about the control of business for the purpose of buying elections.
I betch'a
Capture of CO2 is insanity. It is a trace gas. It always has been a trace gas. It always will be a trace gas.
Without CO2, plants die. With CO2, plants flourish.
Without plants, we die. With plants, we flourish.
If power plants pump out CO2, that is a GOOD thing.
What the research does do is give us a tool when, and if, the climate doomsayers are proven correct, using good science. I don't believe good science has been down across the board, there is too much "green" involved in the form of money for my taste.
I don't disagree with the need to develop methods to control climate change. I disagree with the methods that have been proposed to date to accomplish that control. Or good, effective ways to bypass the need for control.
Everything in moderation, until you can show a smoking gun.
To improve the efficiency of something that should not be done...they will win awards and not accomplish a bloody thing.
Actually he tried and could only get half of it out. But Chuck Norris was able to get the rest of it out!
they will win awards and not accomplish a bloody thing.
This might be a planted article to raise money for research or some big company might be trying to corner a market.
Well played, sirs. Well played.
Sorry I don't have a citation for this, but new growth forests consume carbon dioxide at a far faster rate than old growth forests. If you want to take carbon out of the atmosphere, the best thing might be to clear cut old growth forests, bury the wood somewhere it won't rot and plant new forests.
This sounds similar to the idea of replacing gasoline engines with a fuel cell which converted aluminum to aluminum oxide. When consumed, the aluminum oxide could be refined back to pure aluminum for reuse. The only problem is that the primary method of refining aluminum involves sticking a pure carbon rod into molten aluminum oxide and running an electric current through it converting the carbon rod into carbon dioxide -- just what the inventor was claiming that it would reduce.
MIT had a group of guys create an alge that was put on top of coal smoke stacks, it ate the materials released AND it produced some coal oil to run a portion of the plant. That idea never seemed to make it to the level of roll out one would expect. There must be dozens of these great ideas, that never get farther than a test or two.
That was my first thought. The second was the Tubes - White Punks on Dope.
I guess stupid things make sense when you are stoned.
I wonder if the researchers at MIT consider the possibility that this is a wasted effort:
A problem: nearly one third of CO2 emissions occured since 1998, and it hasnt warmed (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/12/06/a-problem-nearly-one-third-of-co2-emissions-occured-since-1998-and-it-hasnt-warmed/)
It kind of reminded me of those “one weird tip” internet ads.
Not only that, burning the coal or the oil to generate the heat to release the CO2 from limestone also releases CO2. The whole thing is nonsense.
Capture of CO2 is insanity. It is a trace gas. It always has been a trace gas. It always will be a trace gas.Without CO2, plants die. With CO2, plants flourish.
Without plants, we die. With plants, we flourish.
If power plants pump out CO2, that is a GOOD thing.
It goes beyond that... Farmers are now having to fertilize with sulfur more than ever because of... get this... Ultra Low Sulfur Diesel fuel.
Actually the science behind this is quite sound. This is a form of chemical looping combustion if anyone bothered to look at the research behind the article and not just knee jerk arm chair scientist at it. The conversion of lime to Calcium Oxide is is endothermic having a reaction temp of ~900’C the CO2 adsorption reaction is exothermic having a reaction temp of ~650 they obviously are using fluidized bed reactors with integrated combustion which are designed to move hot micronized solid suspensions at high temperatures from one reaction zone to the other thus the lime is both the reactant and the heat transport medium leading to high thermal transfer efficiency are all fluidized beds exhibit. By using the exothermic reaction heat to preheat the incoming reactants to the higher temperature endothermic 900+’c zone heat recovery is achieved the energy extraction point for the generation of steam and therefore power is between the 900 and the 650’c stages. There is no separate combustor to heat the lime to degas it the lime combustor is the power combustor and the lime is the primary heat transfer medium. Again this a chemical looping combustion process using lime as the primary heat transfer and chemcial reagent medium and high pressure 700+’c steam as the secondary power generating cycle. The breakthrough is using the heat of the exothermic cycle carried in the recycled hot lime to lower the energy needed to separate the CO2 from the combustion products stream. Essentially you only need to supply the chemical energy to break the bonds of CO2 from the CaO minus the recovered energy from the exothermic reaction which is significantly less than using animines. This additional chemical energy is already present in the combustion process primary heat rate as a slightly higher coal burning rate, but coal is cheap and CO2 is getting expensive so the economics probably will work out some time soon. This process will also yield high purity CO2 ready to be piped to an oil field for EOR recovery operations where secondary producers pay dearly for CO2 in high purity high pressure form. For those curious yes as a matter of fact I am a scientist ;)
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