Researchers Propose Solar Methanol Island Using Ocean CO2 (arstechnica.com) 251
A PNAS paper published this week outlines a plan to establish 70 islands of solar panels, each 328 feet in diameter, that sends electricity to a hard-hulled ship that acts as an oceanic factory. "This factory uses desalinization and electrolysis equipment to extract hydrogen gas (H2) and carbon dioxide (CO2) from the surrounding ocean water," reports Ars Technica. "It then uses these products to create methanol, a liquid fuel that can be added into, or substituted for, transportation fuels. Every so often, a ship comes to offload the methanol and take it to a supply center on land." From the report: The researchers estimated that we would need approximately 170,000 of these solar island systems to be able to produce enough green methanol to replace all fossil fuels used in long-haul transportation. While that seems like a lot, it's theoretically possible, even if we restrict these systems to ocean expanses where waves don't reach more than seven feet high and there's enough sunlight to meet the system's yearly average need.
Still, the authors admit that this is just the description of a possible prototype: whether it's practical to build or not will depend on the cost of the technology that supports the system, as well as the cost of competing forms of energy used in transportation. Cleaning and maintaining this equipment in a marine environment is also a concern, and the researchers admit that there may be room for alternate setups (like making another fuel instead of methanol) that might make more economic sense. For now, though, it's a compelling idea to avoid additional fossil fuel extraction that is within reach using existing technology.
Still, the authors admit that this is just the description of a possible prototype: whether it's practical to build or not will depend on the cost of the technology that supports the system, as well as the cost of competing forms of energy used in transportation. Cleaning and maintaining this equipment in a marine environment is also a concern, and the researchers admit that there may be room for alternate setups (like making another fuel instead of methanol) that might make more economic sense. For now, though, it's a compelling idea to avoid additional fossil fuel extraction that is within reach using existing technology.
Good idea (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Good idea (Score:5, Interesting)
Why bother with floating solar islands when you can just use floating wind turbines? The tech already exists and is now starting to get deployed on a large scale, in difficult environments like the North Sea.
Build enough turbines that they can provide base load due to geographic distribution (there is always enough wind blowing over a wide area). When there is excess wind use it to extract hydrogen from water. It's inefficient but who cares, the energy is almost free. Then you can run vehicles that can't go battery electric on hydrogen instead, the only emission being water.
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They're talking about putting these where the waves don't get very high, so I suspect that also means the winds generally aren't that strong in these locations. But you certainly have a point that the same idea works with other power sources. You could even put in a nuclear reactor like those found in submarines or aircraft carriers. It mostly boils down to economics.
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It mostly boils down to economics.
Yeah, that's the problem. Everybody asks if it's worth the money. They never ask if it's worth the effort.
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We likely need both with your proposed solution only using excess energy. The wind solution involves moving parts so will be far less durable. Wind turbines also disrupt wind patterns and that could be a problem over the course of time. That is probably a wash since obviously the solar solution would impact ocean heating and therefore currents. Lastly wind turbines are bird slayers.
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Wind turbines also disrupt wind patterns and that could be a problem over the course of time. /.
For this kind of mental problem I suggest: a beer and less writing on
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Anything at sea involves moving part, which are less of a problem than seawater and salt anyway.
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"Anything at sea involves moving part"
Or an anchor. But those parts are in common between the two solutions and generally less sensitive than the bearings in the turbine itself.
"which are less of a problem than seawater and salt anyway"
They aren't isolated problems. The seawater and salt are also a problem for continued operation of the turbine itself. Including building up and clogging it so that it introduces additional friction that would reduce output and could even freeze the turbine. The solar panels
Re: Good idea (Score:2)
It's inefficient but who cares...
Do you really need it explained to you that the math matters?
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Why bother with floating solar islands when you can just use floating wind turbines?
Why bother with floating solar panels or floating wind turbines when we can use floating nuclear power plants?
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Floating nuclear plants are more expensive to build and operate. Also you can't get insurance for them.
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It's inefficient but who cares, the energy is almost free.
The energy may be free but the windmills are not.
The windmills cost money and so the electricity and hydrogen produced will cost money. This cost must compete with other sources for these products. If it cannot produce at competitive prices then it will not be profitable. Without profit the process cannot find investors or keep employees.
If wind power is so cheap then why do the windmill owners demand so much in government subsidies? I say end the subsidies since they think it's so cheap we can use it f
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"That energy would be more wisely invested in building nuclear plants, which provide reliable energy using only a small fraction of the resources, last 2-3 times as long, and return tens to hundreds of times more energy than goes into their creation."
It would but those reactors might make sense powering these desalination plants rather than solar. You eliminate the "not in my back yard" issue.
They covered that (Score:2)
The paper also raises the wind turbine issue. Either would work.
Well, they want to combine the H2 gas with CO2 to (a) pull CO2 out of the ocean, (b) make a liquid (methanol) that's easier to handle than a gas and (c) works in liquid fueled engines already, avoiding the need to convert to new engine types.
Thei
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Still wrong.
You have a load curve over 24h. The lowest valley on that curve is "base load" ... actually base load is usually a little bit higher, as during that time you also fill pumped storages.
Has absolutely nothing to do by what technology you feed power into your grid.
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That's right, however current base-load is higher than it needs to be due to existing pricing incentives. We charge less for power during the low-demand time, so people shift their consumption to that period artificially to save money. If we transition to using more solar then we can in fact change the pattern of economic incentives to further reduce base load over what it has traditionally been. Natural gas or substitutes can be used in a pinch.
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That's right, however current base-load is higher than it needs to be due to existing pricing incentives
The more cheap power we can have, the better of the people of the world become.
It's cool to reduce waste energy, and it's cool to reduce pollution, but the goal should not be to reduce total energy.
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Now, tell me the ecological impact of flooding this much land area?
The smallest ecological impact for the most energy is from nuclear power. Fourth generation nuclear can load follow as they don't use dangerous and slow water cooling and steam turbines. If for some reason steam is desired or required then load following can be achieved with using any excess generation capacity in producing methanol like this research describes. No flooding of valuable land required.
Re:Good idea (Score:4, Insightful)
You want to bring up resources consumed for nuclear power and compare that to anything? You sure about that?
Look at Dr. Ripudaman Malhotra's research on the ecological impact of nuclear power.
http://cmo-ripu.blogspot.com/2... [blogspot.com]
This Dr. Malhotra compares different energy sources by resources consumed, CO2 output, and deaths, per energy produced. Nuclear wins in every case. Sure, you can find outliers but we don't make decisions based on outliers.
In short, the ecological impact of nuclear power is not high. Pointing out a single outlier means nothing on the average.
Here's a chart comparing the price of energy from several sources in four different nations.
http://www.world-nuclear.org/i... [world-nuclear.org]
With the exception of the USA we see nuclear being cheaper than onshore wind. Nuclear is always cheaper than solar power. I like wind power, but I don't believe that it is viable without some nuclear and gas to go with it. It turns out that nuclear and gas are also quite low in costs.
If cost is how we determine ecological impact, and we don't, then we'd be burning far more coal.
Oh, then there is this...
What's the ecological impact of overheating the planet?
Yes, what is the ecological impact of overheating the planet? How does that compare to using nuclear power to prevent it? Dr. Malhotra shows just how little of an ecological impact nuclear power actually makes. That's including the over budget and overdue nuclear power plant projects.
Go ahead, bring me more data. I'd like to see you make your case besides just pointing out a single over budget project.
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If nuclear is so cheap, why do nuclear projects in the US get cancelled when new wind and solar plants spring up like mushrooms in the US?
Politics, not economics.
Good idea? Really? (Score:2)
Well, this is a good idea.
Is it really? Because it doesn't sound like a very good idea. I have no idea how this proposal will prove to be economical and it doesn't sound like the people proposing it have given the matter much thought either. Not to mention it only is a viable solution if it is substantially cheaper than extracting hydrocarbons out of the ground and that seems very unlikely.
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Well, this is a good idea.
Is it really?
Yes, because it produces liquid fuels and there's a whole demographic of holdouts who refuse to buy electric vehicles because can't be refuelled in a couple of minutes.
Re:Good idea? Really? (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, because it produces liquid fuels and there's a whole demographic of holdouts who refuse to buy electric vehicles because can't be refuelled in a couple of minutes.
While there are a few that fall into this category, but mostly its a good ideal because it can replace fossil fuels in vehicles where electrification isn't practical. Such as long haul trucks. The energy density just isn't there, yet, to store enough electricity in batteries for long haul trucks to be practical using this method. I imagine the same can be said for ships and aircraft.
Contrary to wishful thinking heat engines are not going to completely go away anytime soon. There will always be those places where they will be more practical than electric. Best to find a cheap environmental fuel for them as soon as possible.
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There will always be those places where they will be more practical than electric.*
* For a finite value of "always".
Re: Good idea? Really? (Score:2)
there's a whole demographic of holdouts who refuse to buy electric vehicles because can't be refuelled in a couple of minutes.
That's mostly just in your head. Viable electric cars are nearly brand fucking new and so far, there's only one serious player with mere three models, two of which are luxury models (!). This is entirely a manufactured controversy and you've swallowed it hook, line and sinker. In the end, this situation remains orthogonal to any feelings and emotions involved; supply and demand of vehicles [and the energy required to operate them] will be the determining factor.
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Yes, and those guys are idiots.
In 50 years combustion engines will only be in antique cars and probably military. Only very few privately owned will remain.
You basically only have strong reasons to have one in places like Alaska and Siberia.
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Liquid fuels also have a substantial energy density advantage over batteries. A Tesla 3's 75 kWh battery pack (270 MJ) weighs 480 kg [slashdot.org], for a specific energy of 0.56 MJ/kg.. Gasoline has a specific energy [wikipedia.org] of 46.3 MJ/kg, or nearly two orders of magnitude higher. Methanol is 19.7 MJ/kg. Some of this advantage is lost due to the ~20% efficienc
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Just read a paper that estimates to pollution from ships to cause 260 000 death PER YEAR !...
Link?
Re: Good idea (Score:2)
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Big ships have huge engines with steam preheaters to soften up viscous, unrefined, cheap, nasty oil so they can burn it. It's so bad they have rules near ports they have to switch to better fuels because it causes so much pollution.
But they are working on it
http://www.imo.org/en/MediaCen... [imo.org]
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Wouldn't it be cheaper and easier just to go back to sailing ships for most cargoes? It's not like we send much of anything by sea that is time-critical....
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Re: Good idea (Score:2)
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Not all pollution is the same. SOx emissions especially are almost irrelevant to the environment providing we don't release them in a concentrated form in a population centre. Unfortunately it's the SOx emissions that are compared to cars which is sensationalist bullshit given that cruiseliners are pretty damn bloody horrid with CO2 emissions and other pollution that matters as well. But as usual the media jumps on the worst number and cries foul!
Anyway I learnt something today: duur=expensive, so I didn't
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Depending what you call "pollution", a single cruise ship produces as much pollution as 1 million cars.
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No.
Methanol is mildly toxic, but much much less toxic than gasoline (or diesel fuel, which is what it is proposing to replace). Try drinking gasoline some time, tell me what happens.
and as for greenhouse potential, well, it's a volatile organic compound (VOC). It has much the same greenhouse trapping effect as any other VOC, like, say, gasoline vapor. The whole point, however, is to not spray it into the atmosphere, but to burn it, so it is essentially identical to gasoline in effect of combustion product.
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What if the CO2 taken from the oceans for fuel produces a fuel that contributes LESS CO2 than the fuel it's replacing- including extractions costs?
Also, the CO2 from this extraction process is concentrated and can be dealt with accordingly.
Waiting on perfect solutions just means waiting forever.
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Economics? (Score:5, Interesting)
A PNAS paper published this week outlines a plan to establish 70 islands of solar panels, each 328 feet in diameter, that sends electricity to a hard-hulled ship that acts as an oceanic factory. "This factory uses desalinization and electrolysis equipment to extract hydrogen gas (H2) and carbon dioxide (CO2) from the surrounding ocean water," reports Ars Technica. "It then uses these products to create methanol, a liquid fuel that can be added into, or substituted for, transportation fuels. Every so often, a ship comes to offload the methanol and take it to a supply center on land.
Ok let's stipulate for the sake of argument that this is technologically possible. It still doesn't explain the economics of it and that isn't a trivial concern. It doesn't matter AT ALL if they can build the thing if it doesn't have an economic payback within a reasonable period of time. Gut feeling is that I have a hard time seeing something like this actually turning a profit.
Here are several of the reasons why I'm dubious of the economics
A) Anything on the ocean necessarily involves a LOT of upkeep and by extension cost
B) It's not at all clear how efficient this process is at doing what it claims
C) It's going to be complicated to design, build and operate and complexity = cost
D) It's not clear what problem this solves that would not be more economically solved via other (simpler) methods
E) How exactly is mining CO2 from the ocean and releasing it into the atmosphere going to mitigate climate change given that we aren't going to stop pulling hydrocarbons out of the ground any time soon. (because it's almost certainly cheaper than this "solution")
While that seems like a lot, it's theoretically possible, even if we restrict these systems to ocean expanses where waves don't reach more than seven feet high and there's enough sunlight to meet the system's yearly average need.
Is there actually a place on the ocean where the waves never get higher than 7 feet? That seems improbable to me. It would have to be near a coast and frankly if it depends on oceans staying placid I think it's doomed from jump street.
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A percentage of atmospheric CO2 we release is dissolving into the ocean, rather than acting as a greenhouse gas. It's one of the few things that is making global warming not as bad. However, it's also turning into carbonic acid as it dissolves, which
Moving CO2 around (Score:3)
A percentage of atmospheric CO2 we release is dissolving into the ocean, rather than acting as a greenhouse gas. It's one of the few things that is making global warming not as bad.
No, it's one of the things that is making climate change not as bad YET. The ocean does not have infinite capacity to absorb CO2 and there appears to be evidence we are or soon will be exceeding the carrying capacity by some meaningful amount if we desire to keep the climate close to what it is now.
Therefore, pulling the CO2 in the ocean may be even more important pulling it out of the air, although the CO2 can move between the two.
Correct which is why this technology makes little sense because we need to be leaving it in the rocks where it already was or finding ways to put it back there. Moving CO2 between the water and air accomplishes
How about some common sense? (Score:3)
This batch of ivory tower thinking is in desperate need of some common sense.
The objective is to turn seawater into methanol. Why do you need to be somewhere in the the ocean to do this? Is there a fear that this can only be done in international waters?
They actually propose building floating solar power plants. This adds a lot of expense and complexity for little or no gain. It adds expense as saltwater will greatly increase maintenance costs. The fact that they are on the ocean greatly increases costs as you can't readily fix them. It is inevitable that storms will damage them and knock them loose from moorings where they will become an environmental hazard. They also want to build their desalination processing plants on the water.
A dose of common sense increases the feasibility and reduces the cost of this proposal by an order of magnitude.
Simply build the plants near the seashore. You can run a pipe to the ocean to get saltwater and run power lines from solar power plants on land to provide power. You can then run a pipeline to export the methanol. You can run a second pipe to export a byproduct of the desalination process called fresh water. You could even be environmentally smart and put the plant somewhere where there is a shortage of fresh water. There is absolutely no real world benefit to putting this operation on the ocean.
File this under Dyson Sphere (Score:2)
How to catch waterfowl in South India (Score:3)
This technique is very similar. Floating solar panels, then make hydrogen and then make methanol and use it in infernal combustion engine delivering 30% efficiency. Yay! Victory.
The battery prices are crashing. Halving every seven years, and there is no end in sight. Already on-ground solar plus storage is displacing peaker power plants. The battery electric cars are cheaper than gasoline cars in the F and E segments (>100K and > 50K). They have TCO parity in D segment (>35K). Price parity is expected in two years. TCO parity in C segment (>25K) at the same time. Why go through this complex process?
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And CPUs are doubling in speed every 18 months! Exponential growth is great but unsustainable.
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Cost is always the issue (Score:2)
Green energy is great but the cost (energy supplied in the process) and maintenance (long-term commitments) of them is often greater than nuclear and other forms of dense energy production.
This sounds like a great concept but having worked technology for oil platforms, it's by no means simple. The wind itself is so filled with salty moisture that even without getting anything wet, things just rust out and between the chemical environment and the vibrations of the oceans even the solder joints in sealed boxe
Multiple problems (Score:2)
Putting 100m square patches atop a living ocean will affect the ecosystem around them. This same problem exists with most land-based solar arrays; they affect the amount of sun received by whatever is behind them. Solar roofing is a more workable idea, since that shading by the solar array is already a function of the roof.
Pulling CO2 that would normally be absorbed and converted to oxygen and plant matter will affect the ecosystem. Pumping atmospheric CO2 though a biomass of algae, then converting that to
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Deranged fantasies (Score:2)
Fantasy miracle tech after fantasy miracle tech. Denial after denial. Just so we do not have to change anything. It will not work. Conditions will already get unpleasant on this planet. Unless emissions are drastically lowered, they may become deadly.
George Olah (Score:2)
The late-great chemist George Olah outlined strategies and processes for what he termed "The Methanol Economy". Good to see some others continuing that work.
https://www.technologyreview.c... [technologyreview.com]
Methanol is a crap fuel (Score:3)
Methanol is a crap fuel. It has the same problems as ethanol, notably the low energy density and hygroscopicity, plus it is horribly toxic. Just getting enough of it on your skin can cause blindness.
If we want alternatives to current fossil-based motor fuels, we already have them. The gasoline replacement is called butanol [wikipedia.org], and the diesel replacement is called green diesel [wikipedia.org]. They can be made from algae, which we should be able to produce cost-effectively in open raceway ponds, at current oil prices. It's not as profitable as fossil fuels, but we need to stop using those whether they are profitable or not.
Why Don't They....? (Score:3)
The answer to every "Why Don't They" question has the same answer: Money. - R. Heinlein
Well, no kidding it's all about the cost. If the cost isn't "compelling", then the idea is not. I'm also not sure why this has to be floating around on the ocean, vastly complicating maintenance of the panels. We have these "pipe" things that can suck up water a ways out from shore and pull it in, and there are large chunks of the earth that have big flat spaces near a shore.
The fundamental proposition is to convert the 50,000 big ships in the world, mostly cargo carriers, to burning methanol, which can have several sources. It's a fair idea. It's economics are not "compelling", though, by existing means of production, much less an experimental new one.
The existing ones leverage some chemical energy stored in the feed stocks, such as wood chips or corn or farm wastes; one that depends 100% on energy inserted into basic molecules by electricity is unlikely to make cheaper ethanol that we already have, at a guess.
And what about the whole ethanol idea to start with? The "hydrogen crowd" are already pissed that they aren't getting hydrogen cars because batteries have seized the market, there. Any chance for the hydrogen fans in big transport engines?
One thing does seem likely to me: even the 3% (?) of carbon emissions that come from those 50,000 ships have to be reduced somehow, and I doubt we're building 50,000 little nukes. (A cargo ship only runs on about 25,000 HP, I think, under 20MW, hardly worth a nuke.) I'm guessing it'll be either methanol or hydrogen.
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Yoicks, ships are getting bigger. 80,000 HP is getting common. Still not enough to justify a nuke, though, especially tens of thousands of them.
Primitives... still burning hydrocarbons (Score:2)
Combustion engines are the past. Only an idiot would use electricity from solar power to make hydrocarbons, instead of using the electricity directly.
You wanna know what else does this? (Score:2)
Before we kill ourselves trying to come up with a technological solution for removing CO2 from the atmosphere, let's not forget that a natural one already exists. We just have to stop clear-cutting forests, start replanting more trees than we cut down, and bury the used trees to prevent them from releasing their extracted carbon back into the atmosphere as CO2 (wood an
Nothing really 'green' about this idea (Score:2)
We need solar, wind, and nuclear power. Stop burning things, it's counter-productive.
Power density (Score:2)
What power density is this proposed to achieve? They're starting with solar, about 20% efficient, but only if the array is constantly maintained with a constantly running cleaning system to remove the salt spray that'll coat the panels, then using the power for desalinization, which needs a tremendous amount of power, and electrolysis to hydrogen, also a low-efficiency process, then conversion to methanol, which will also further reduce power output. Putting a few 1% efficiency conversions after electricit
Re:Another way to not face the problem (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't think the point is to remove CO2 from the system. It's to slow down the addition of more CO2 to the system, like when fossil fuels are burned. So it could be an overall carbon neutral fuel source. Not as good as a carbon negative source, but much better than what we're doing now.
It's all about the economics (Score:2)
I don't think the point is to remove CO2 from the system. It's to slow down the addition of more CO2 to the system, like when fossil fuels are burned. So it could be an overall carbon neutral fuel source. Not as good as a carbon negative source, but much better than what we're doing now.
Even if true that cannot and will not happen unless it is meaningfully cheaper than extracting hydrocarbons from the ground. So any discussion of this project without a serious discussion of the economics involved is a waste of everyone's time. The only reason we are seriously talking about solar and wind is because they have a reasonable path to achieving net cost parity and/or superiority over fossil fuels for a lot of use cases. (in some cases they are already there) Unless this has a similar path to
Re: Another way to not face the problem (Score:2)
I don't think the point is to remove CO2 from the system.
Eventually, hopefully; certainly not any time soon... my idea is to use laser-powered nanobots to assemble a space elevator 'in-situ' out of atmospheric carbon... remember, you heard it here first. ;p
Re: Another way to not face the problem (Score:2)
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It is about circulating it instead of adding new CO2 from fossil sources. You pull the CO2 out of the water (or out of the air, there are interesting approaches for that too), then you make fuel with it you can burn in a car, for instance. Overall result:
You have as much CO2 in the air as before.
The traditional way would be taking some fossil fuel and burn that. Result:
You have now more CO2 in the air and a global warming problem.
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It seems your understanding of ocean chemistry is about as good as your spelling abilities "Dood".
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ITYM "you're" a doosh.
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You need to learn more about how gasses dissolve in liquids, and how these equilibriums work.
Something like this? ;)
The present fractional concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is 400 ppm, corresponding to a mass density of 0.00079 kg CO2/m^3. Thus, direct capture of CO2 from the atmosphere, for example by regenerable adsorption on organic amines, necessitates the processing of large volumes of air. Due to the reversible, pH-dependent interconversion of carbon dioxide in water between dissolved CO2 [carbonic acid CO2 (aq)], bicarbonate HCO3-, and carbonate CO2^3-, the effective CO2 concentration in seawater at a pH of 8.1, in equilibrium with the atmosphere, is 0.099 kg CO2/m^3 (i.e., a factor 125 larger than in air). The time constant for the establishment of CO 2 equilibrium between the atmosphere and surface ocean waters is less than a few years.
(From TFSA [doi.org])
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It's not efficient, and the panels don't last long enough. It would be better to research how to make panels more than 20% efficient, then put that to use once you get better than 60% efficiency for something that lasts
I'm perennially amazed by the PV efficiency straw man. It's almost as if there were some disinformation campaign going on regarding the economy factors of PV systems. That not how any of this works!
about 10 years before it needs replacing.
Bwahaha! [psu.edu]
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This particular scheme depends on the generation being highly decentralized, because the CO2 would come from seawater adjacent to each of the solar arrays. No centralized source would be applicable.
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The article says each complex of 70 "islands" (I guess artificial floating islands sounds better than anchored barges, which is what these would be) would generate 24 MW.
It says "we would need approximately 170,000 of these solar island systems", so 1,190,000 barges, with a total output power of 4080 GW.
The single nuclear plant would need roughly 640 times the capacity of the current most powerful fully operational nuclear plant.
It would truly be a sight to behold.
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Yes nuclear plants require concrete. And? What do you think other types of generating plants are built from , Gummy Bears? Once built however nuclear generates no CO2 other than that used in maintenance and staff transport.
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nuclear generates no CO2 other than that used in maintenance and staff transport. ... building the plant, decommissioning it.
And in mining, transport of minerals, refining, enriching
Why build a nuke when you can build a wind plant, or several?
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Why build a nuke when you can build a wind plant, or several?
Because the nuclear power plant will require less mining and refining of material per energy produced.
http://cmo-ripu.blogspot.com/2... [blogspot.com]
This difference is not small, it's an order of magnitude. We can certainly improve wind power to lower material requirements but not this much. Also, we can use some research and development to lower nuclear power material requirements as well.
What's worse, nuclear power or global warming? If a plan to avert global warming discounts the use of nuclear power then I cannot
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Yeah, I'm wondering what's wrong with these websites that insist on not quoting the original numbers.
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Arent we dying fast enough?
Because t process uses CO2 that is already dissolved in the ocean, it would be carbon neutral.
But there needs to be a way of folding up the whole apparatus quickly if bad weather approaches.
Not carbon neutral (Score:2)
Because t process uses CO2 that is already dissolved in the ocean, it would be carbon neutral.
It would only be carbon neutral if it required no carbon to build or maintain. Neither of those would be true. It might be operationally better than the solutions we currently use but I see no path to it being actually carbon neutral. What we hope for is that it reduces carbon output to a level the ecosystem can absorb without substantial ill effects.
And it's a moot discussion unless someone can explain how the economics of this are going to make it cost competitive with extracting fossil fuels from the g
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It is cost effective when the tax on oil based fuels is high enough.
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When the tax on oil based fuels is high enough then people get voted into office to lower those taxes.
I keep hearing Democrats talk about how they are going to "force" people do this and that. This just tells me that they don't believe in democracy. A democracy cannot "force" people do anything that they don't want to do.
How do you "force" people to get off oil? You provide an alternative that is lower cost. Go work on making alternatives cheaper rather than on making oil more expensive. Taxing oil isn
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Jesus H Christ on a pogo stick, where do you right wingers/libertarians/whatever anti-democratic party group you associated with (I bet you are a "free thinking rationalist") get your ideas? A democracy cannot "force" people to do anything that they do not want to do? I guess no more rule of law then, no more governance at all. Let's open the prisons, get rid of speed limits, and recreate the hollywood version of the wild west.
Seriously, who thinks this is worth even considering? You want to say that th
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But if you believe in the rule of law, then you believe that a democracy can force people to do things that they don't want to.
That's your problem, and that's why the original poster is right.
The US reduced, quite enormously, the amount of CO2 it produced.
How? By forcing people to use renewable, by selling carbon credits? No, by moving from a high C02 producing fuel (Coal) to a low C02 producing one (Natural Gas).
This wasn't "forced", economics made it work and it was vastly successful.
Forcing people is like trying to make a dog run by dragging it with a leash. Yeah, it moves, but moves much further if you make it WANT to r
Re:Not carbon neutral (Score:5, Interesting)
The US Navy estimates it can make jet fuel from seawater and air for not much more than the normal kind costs in much of the world, and there's a working demonstration plant on the west coast of Canada actually doing it.
Oil subsidies are mostly due to it being a strategic resource. If you can make it, then those subsidies are no longer necessary. Without them, some of the synthetic processes are quite likely to become competitive in the near future.
Re: Great, MORE free CO2! (Score:4, Interesting)
On the other hand, every square inch of ocean surface that we cover with a solar panel represents a reduction in photosynthesis (and natural carbon sequestration); instead of seventy islands of solar panels powering one factory ship, we should have one nuke plant powering seventy ships.
Re: (Score:2)
Agreed. This is an excellent candidate for nuclear energy. The US Navy would be a good partner on such a project. This would also negate some of the impact on currents from depriving that localized heating.
Re: (Score:2)
"as we can put the CO2 back in the air much faster then it can be devolved. Granted it is better than other options."
That is probably true but it's been dissolving through the entire industrial revolution.
Re:Great, MORE free CO2! (Score:4, Informative)
Technically we are using plant matter that had died and been buried millions of years ago, so it too is carbon neutral...
"Carbon neutral" refers to carbon emitted into the atmosphere, and it's referring to carbon we put in the atmosphere now, not a hundred million years ago. So, no: taking carbon that is not in the atmosphere right now, and burning it to exhaust the waste into the atmoshere is not in any way "technically carbon neutral".
Saying this tends to eliminate any meaning whatsoever to that phrase and confuse the conversation. (It's like people who reply to conversations about energy conservation by saying "energy is always conserved, that's a law of physics, so we don't have to worry about energy conservation." No. That's not what we mean.)
Re:Great, MORE free CO2! (Score:4, Insightful)
The ocean matters as much as the atmosphere, both for the detrimental effects to ocean life and because the ocean acts as a sink for atmospheric CO2. If a process adds no CO2 to the combined ocean+atmosphere, then it's carbon neutral in the way that matters to humans and other vulnerable species.
That inclusion of the ocean, of course, is critical to understanding how the technology which this article is about would be useful -- because it isn't atmospherically neutral, only ocean+atmosphere neutral.
Re: (Score:2)
Saying this tends to eliminate any meaning whatsoever to that phrase and confuse the conversation. (It's like people who reply to conversations about energy conservation by saying "energy is always conserved, that's a law of physics, so we don't have to worry about energy conservation." No. That's not what we mean.)
I'm going to wager that saying that is on purpose.
Re: (Score:2)
That is true over a long enough period of time. The time it takes for CO2 to dissolve in the ocean is much lower and the impact of all this extra CO2 dissolved in the oceans is a big part of the concern from carbon release.
Re: Great, MORE free CO2! (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
With the assumption that we are already outpacing the natural subsuming of CO2 into the ecosystem, changing it ALL over to another system, will necessarily generate an overlapping (additional) amount. This plan will result in a net increase in CO2. Over the long term, it will centralize power and create a maintenance nightmare. Also, this does not take into account the infrastructure beyond the minimal panel-space. eg Where the workers live and parts are kept and factories will have to be built to make thes
Re: (Score:2)
You are applying a conservation rule that doesn't necessarily apply here. This will necessarily generate an additional consumption of energy and resources but not necessarily CO2.
Re: (Score:2)
The Ars Technica article says "produces 15,300 t/y of methanol" (doesn't specify short, long, or metric tons).
Divide by 365 to get t/day, divide by molecular weight of methanol (32.04 g/mol), multiply by molecular weight of CO2 (44.01 g/mol), I get 57.6 t/day of CO2 extracted from the ocean.
Does your "1200kg of CO2 per kW of solar capacity" assume that fossil energy is used to produce the panels? I couldn't readily find such a number, everything is about CO2 per kWh of energy produced over the lifetime of