Posted on 08/03/2024 4:18:04 PM PDT by Eleutheria5
Pute Methane itself has no smell.
Farts smell because of the entrained oop particles and partially digested food coming out with the methane.
“Farts smell because of the entrained oop particles and partially digested food coming out with the methane.”
The smell comes from bacteria generated volatile sulfur compounds.
We knew that decades ago from the smell.
“Methanol releases fewer pollutant gases than traditional marine fuels, such as sulfur oxides (SOx), nitrogen oxides (NOx), and particulate”
This 100 times this^^
Methanol has no sulfur, it doesn’t make particulates and you can run it with a fuel air mix that NOx doesn’t form. Marine diesels are some of the most polluting on the planet each putting out as much as a million card worth. Of this criteria pollutants.
As a added bonus you can make methanol from anything with carbon in it once you gasification plant it. CO + H2 = Methanol at high efficiency. That could be gasified coal, peat,wood or crop wastes,, municipal trash, sewage sludge, harbor dredging spoils,biomass from salt water agriculture, algae, kelp,water hydrilla, the dreaded kudzu killing the South anything that grows anywhere land or ocean based.
Then you can also go from CO2 +3H2 = Methanol this opens up electrons or heat to methanol. Curtailment wind in the middle of the night , or solar in the Sahara. Better yet nuclear power off peak build out fast sodium reactors and run them flat out use the off peak to turn seawater into methanol. Ask the US Navy they already perfected the tech it takes seawater puts it into a bipolar electrolytic cell where the CO2 in the water comes out first then H2 gas you get the co2 for free as the Gibbs energy is lower than H2. Seawater has 150 times the CO2 as air it makes absolute sense to harvest CO2 from seawater so much so the Navy plans to make jet fuel with this tech and it’s carrier’s reactors at sea. They flew a jet already on the JP5 they made using nothing but electric power and seawater. You could also get bulk CO2 from any ethanol plant cheaply, same for brewers, and any sewage plant fermenter bulk CO2 is $50 per tonne on the industrial market cheaper if you have rail access. Water plus CO2 plus any form of electrons = Methanol. Nuclear,Hydro,geothermal,high latitude wind, desert solar all will never run out. Methanol is a vehicle to move carbon and hydrogen. It’s easy to make , three times denser than Hydrogen and can as an industrial chemical be turned into thousands of products from plastics to lubricants to protein powder for animal feed <<< the Chinese are going coal to methanol to complete protein for pig feed right now today.
Methanol also can be used in flexfuel vehicles directly or via the Mobil process to gasoline with a nice by product of propane also a top notch heavy vehicle fuel for clean exhaust.
“To achieve the same energy content as gasoline, a methanol fuel tank needs to be approximately 2.5 times larger. This is due to methanol’s lower energy density compared to gasoline.”
Not entirely accurate, methanol has a 115+ octane rating it can be run without knock on a 16:1 compression.ratio this raises the thermal efficiency of the OTTO cycle 30% to put it in small engines in the 45% BSFC and large ship engines over 50%. The typical petrol ICE is 25 to 30% at best and only in a narrow window of its operating range. With super high octane fuels you can downsize the displacement and go to crazy levels of boost plus every high compression and even higher expansion ratios using VVT and the Miller cycle. You can not do that with petrol it will crater the motor. You also can go to the MCCI cycle which all diesels use and 20:1+ compression ratios here again getting into the 50% BSFC range for large bore engines.
Fuel volumetric density is not the deciding factor. Cost per mile shipped is ships have plenty of volume they are mass limited not volume limited in every case other than maybe iron ore bulk transport or nuclear waste transport. As for vehicles here again going from 25% to 50% BSFC halves the volume difference. Make that a hybrid and halve that again vs a regular petrol ICE. I have driven a regular Corolla vs a hybrid Corolla both 2023 and the hybrid was doubling the urban MPG or better every time.
“Fuel volumetric density is not the deciding factor. “
True. They will burn the dirty HFO at sea and switch over when they near Port.
I was an O2 bomb generator tech back in the day. I can't fathom putting seawater into the cells!
It takes 3 H2 for every one CO2 to make methanol. Why go to the air for co2 there are so many better places to get bulk co2. Seawater if you are close to the ocean would be hundreds of times better. Co2 is a bulk chemical traded ,shipped all over planet most of that comes from brewers, or ethanol fermenter plants at like $50 a tonne it’s ludicrous to spend $600+ to grab it from the air other than to greenwash and virtue signal.
It takes 55 kwh to make a Kg of hydrogen you need three for one vs co2 by the mol of co2 not co2 mass. Why three to one well normally methanol is made with carbon monoxide CO not CO2 and that is CO + 2H2 = Methanol that pesky extra O atom has to.go and that needs another H2 for CO2+H2= CO + H20 than two more H2 for the CO + 2H2 step.
Chemically to make one Kg of methanol you need 126 grams of hydrogen staring at the normal CO point having to turn CO2 into CO add half again as much so 63 more grams for a total of 189 grams per kg.
Methanol is sold by the metric tonne (1000Kg) so a unit of sale or a tonne needs 189Kg H2 per tonne. At 55kwh per kg thats 10395 kWh or 10.3 megawatt hours. Whole sale power at 0400 this morning can in Texas was selling for $17 per Mwh that’s that would be $175 per tonne in energy costs. Plus 1400kg of co2 per tonne at $50 per tonne wholesale co2 prices forget air capture that’s $70 in co2 liquid. So materials is $245 per tonne. The current methanol bulk price is $432 per tonne in the US.
Methanol is 6.63lb/gal...6.63lb is 3kg
So something like 333 gal per tonne of mass. Works out to about $1.29 a gallon at 432 per tonne mass.
“True. They will burn the dirty HFO at sea and switch over when they near Port.”
Not just near port any nation that’s a party to UMCLOS has put emissions limits inside all of their EEZs as well those are 200 nm from shore. For economic and emissions purposes the EEZs are territorial waters and that nations rules apply to any vessel in them regardless where flagged if they are making a innocent passage they can ask for a pass and waiver but if they are port calling they must abide. Only the very remote high seas will ever see HFO every where else is already MGO or light diesel for emissions regs this is why the push to methanol it’s cheaper than MGO and HFO is going the way of the dodo bird.
speaking of methanol, I think indy cars run on some kind of alcohol, but I do not know what kind.
Anything but fossil fuels, please! No matter how expensive or inefficient! Our woke religion demands it!
Toyota’s New Camry Gets 51 MPG and I’m Buying One -—
Scotty Kilmer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CEQcr0CoZes
********* All 2025 Camrys will be hybrids!
******* Thanks. Very informative. So a car run on methanol will need what size fuel tank vs a gasoline car’s fuel tank? To have equal energy output? AKA travel the same 50 miles?
There was a guy who was on Coast to Coast AM yearly, boosting methanol as a fuel. https://www.perplexity.ai/search/there-was-a-guy-who-was-on-coa-X7N2Vm46S4SM6FggG5qXjQ
Anhydrous ammonia is very toxic; it is still used regularly in the RV industry as refrigerant (any dual-use refrigerator in an rv has it). Nasty stuff.
How about whale blubber;?
And just a few years ago we were on the verge of running engines with pure water - I saw the ads🥸
Caught me a unicorn, but he refuses to fart.
INDY CARS HAVE BEEN RUNNING ON METHANOL FOR YEARS, IIRC
Indycars run on ethanol, not methanol.
They ought to use Ethanol.
Pull up to the pump, and get a couple of gallons.
Drive 2 miles home, and drink the rest.
You can tell tales of how far you drove, all the exotic sights you saw, what great milage you got, and how you saved the planet.
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