Posted on 11/06/2020 5:37:58 PM PST by Jonty30
Many industries use heat-intensive processes that generally require the burning of fossil fuels, but a surprising green fuel alternative is emerging in the form of metal powders. Ground very fine, cheap iron powder burns readily at high temperatures, releasing energy as it oxidizes in a process that emits no carbon and produces easily collectable rust, or iron oxide, as its only emission.
(Excerpt) Read more at newatlas.com ...
Could be unsafe. Elemental metal powders are one ingredient of thermite mixtures.
How come the title says “Dutch brewery” but the URL says “Bavarian (German) brewery”?
BTW, carbon release, particularly carbon dioxide, is no hazard.
I just typed in what was part of the website, so I don’t know about any discrepancies
You can burn iron powder in a candle flame.
Jump to about 2:00 in this video - they are burning iron powder in an alcohol flame.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0maX83j2d1c
The idea these guys have is to use iron powder as an energy storage medium, that energy coming from renewables.
Direct reduction iron (sponge iron) doesn't use coke, nor does it melt the iron. The reducing agent is usually CO/H2 (town gas, syngas, coal gas, etc.) that's made from coal or natural gas. Sponge iron can be made with methane alone or just hydrogen. The H2 only method hasn't reached commercial status.
It's the hydrogen angle that brings in renewables. Yep, making hydrogen gas using solar (or nuclear). IDK if sponge iron is good enough for burning. Sponge iron can be made into mild steel (low carbon) in an electric arc furnace. That step will give off CO2 from any carbon in the iron.
Candle flame is hotter than one may think, over 1600°F.
Thanks Jonty30. Probably not a coincidence that the cave people used red ochre for wall paintings and body adornment, and how there is no trace of soot from fires used to light the work of the cave painters.
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Oh ok... that’s a good point
How much energy is used in the process to make powdered iron?
Offhand I don’t know, but if it’s eternally recyclable, it’s probably pretty small over time.
At what temperature does the iron powder ignite?
It’s says here that it is on par with hydrocarbons, without any release of carbon in the process.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/scientists-green-fuel-metal-1.4058398
Its says here that it is on par with hydrocarbons, without any release of carbon in the process.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/scientists-green-fuel-metal-1.4058398
It might be useful for power plants, possibly. A replacement for coal.
Well, now we “just” need an efficient solar furnace for smelting rust into iron.
I hope it’s as good as it sounds!
Theres two giant solar power towers in Nevada near Vegas that easily reach 1000’C more than enough for direct reduction of iron oxide to iron. This process is similar to the chemical looping combustion system that was proposed to allow the direct production of hydrogen and high pressure CO2 from any carbon source with minimal losses in the process and high purity hydrogen and CO2. Both are valuable industry chemicals, hydrogen particularly is used in massive quantities by the petrochemical industry to make high octane gasoline and low sulfur diesels. Nearly all of the nitrogen based fertilizers that feed the whole planet are hydrogen based via ammonia synthesis and Urea also made from gaseous hydrogen. CO2 is used as a solvent for hundreds of chemical processes from vegetable oil extractions, caffeine purification, even processing nuclear wastes via supercritical solvent extraction. CO2 is also used in massive amounts to drive oil from older wells via tertiary recovery methods. I worked with Denbry on a CO2 Project in graduate school it takes two to three barrels of CO2 injected to get one bbl of oil back it’s actually a net carbon sink more carbon is sequestered underground than the amounts released by burning the oil produced how’s that for green tech :)
Seems to me that the iron would be more valuable to be reused as iron to manufacture things.
You can put iron filings into an air tight container and when the iron oxidizes, it creates a vacuum in the container.
427.87 °C / 802.17 °F
Lower than that of a match.
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