From the University of Illinois – Ionic liquid catalyst helps turn emissions into fuel
University of Illinois chemical and biological engineering professor Paul Kenis and his research group joined forces with researchers at Dioxide Materials, a startup company, to produce a catalyst that improves artificial photosynthesis. The company, in the university Research Park, was founded by retired chemical engineering professor Richard Masel. The team reported their results in the journal Science.
Artificial photosynthesis is the process of converting carbon dioxide gas into useful carbon-based chemicals, most notably fuel or other compounds usually derived from petroleum, as an alternative to extracting them from biomass.
In plants, photosynthesis uses solar energy to convert carbon dioxide (CO2) and water to sugars and other hydrocarbons. Biofuels are refined from sugars extracted from crops such as corn. However, in artificial photosynthesis, an electrochemical cell uses energy from a solar collector or a wind turbine to convert CO2 to simple carbon fuels such as formic acid or methanol, which are further refined to make ethanol and other fuels.
“The key advantage is that there is no competition with the food supply,” said Masel, a co-principal investigator of the paper and CEO of Dioxide Materials, “and it is a lot cheaper to transmit electricity than it is to ship biomass to a refinery.”
However, one big hurdle has kept artificial photosynthesis from vaulting into the mainstream: The first step to making fuel, turning carbon dioxide into carbon monoxide, is too energy intensive. It requires so much electricity to drive this first reaction that more energy is used to produce the fuel than can be stored in the fuel.
The Illinois group used a novel approach involving an ionic liquid to catalyze the reaction, greatly reducing the energy required to drive the process. The ionic liquids stabilize the intermediates in the reaction so that less electricity is needed to complete the conversion.
The researchers used an electrochemical cell as a flow reactor, separating the gaseous CO2 input and oxygen output from the liquid electrolyte catalyst with gas-diffusion electrodes. The cell design allowed the researchers to fine-tune the composition of the electrolyte stream to improve reaction kinetics, including adding ionic liquids as a co-catalyst.
“It lowers the overpotential for CO2 reduction tremendously,” said Kenis, who is also a professor of mechanical science and engineering and affiliated with the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology. “Therefore, a much lower potential has to be applied. Applying a much lower potential corresponds to consuming less energy to drive the process.”
Next, the researchers hope to tackle the problem of throughput. To make their technology useful for commercial applications, they need to speed up the reaction and maximize conversion.
“More work is needed, but this research brings us a significant step closer to reducing our dependence on fossil fuels while simultaneously reducing CO2 emissions that are linked to unwanted climate change,” Kenis said.
Graduate students Brian Rosen, Michael Thorson, Wei Zhu and Devin Whipple and postdoctoral researcher Amin Salehi-Khojin were co-authors of the paper. The U.S. Department of Energy supported this work.
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The Spanish have been producing oil from CO2 for some time now:
http://www.biopetroleo.com/english/
Of course it didn’t come up in the news.
George (Jim) Hebbard, P.E. Fortunately Andrea Rossi’s October 6 E-Cat test was a major success, and energy efficiency will never need concern us again.
I’m doubtful. Do you have some links?
Ian:
First, familiarize yourself with the null hypothesis. Second, if you still have questions, repeat the first step.
In other words, where is it shown that CO2 emissions are causing climate change. Notice the emphasis on the word shown. Shown, and not just said or claimed, but actually shown, as in demonstrated.
BTW: I did notice you said linked. That’s a pretty low hurdle. Is that deliberate?
R. Gates says:
October 7, 2011 at 12:10 pm
Question: Suppose this scheme really did work, and energy could be economically harnessed by removing atmospheric CO2. What would a lower limit be? i.e. Would some global consensus for CO2 levels be agreed to below which we would stop using this process to get energy? It might start getting a wee bit cold if levels dropped much below 200-250 ppm.
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This will probably get snipped, but the stupid, it burns!!! Plants WILL DIE if CO2 levels drop that far. The plants will die, the animals that eat them will die, and we would die. COLD??? You are not talking about cold you inconceivably stupid jerk. If you waved your magic want and all the evil CO2 went away cold would not be the problem. The end of life on earth would be the problem for a short time. Then no one would care. Because they would be dead!!! It is unbelievable to me that people as willfully ignorant as the alarmists talk with authority about things… (will rant for the rest of the day…)
It would be much much much cheaper to let the CO2 go free into the atmosphere and make H2 and O2 from water using carefully chosen electrodes and (possibly) subjecting it to radio transmissions (there are strange hyper-efficient results which SG Foxcroft told me are ‘completely irreproducible at will’).
It is well known that CO2 in a hot fire absorbs energy and converts to CO then back again depending on conditions. Roughly speaking I recall it as:
C+O2 => CO2 + 32 MJ/kg of C
CO2 +24MJ/kg of C => CO+ 1/2 O2
CO+ 1/2 O2 => CO2 + 24 MJ/kg of C
Classic zero-sum game.
To reverse any of these processes takes as much energy (or more) than you get out of it later. Excess electricity? Make H2 and burn it again after a few hours when the wind dies or just pump it into the nearest natural gas pipeline.
The idea that CO is a reasonable intermediary on the way to producing liquid fuels is silly. Yes it is interesting, but it is not a viable alternative to lots of better choices. Feeding algae ponds to produce oil is far more efficient and you don’t need SASOL to come to the party.
Another possiblity is to drive a different chemcial reaction tuned for maximum energy density (chemical battery). Then get the energy back as electricity.
R. Gates says:
October 7, 2011 at 12:10 pm
Some say that under about 150 ppm CO2 plant life as we know it is not sustainable. I thnk volcanoes and forest fires would compensate for humanity’s stupidity and we would never achieve such reduction as to kill the biosphere. In any case, life is extremely resilient and something else would follow our dismiss.
“The key advantage is that there is no competition with the food supply,”
All depends upon where they would put their wide solar panels arrays needed for the artificial photosynthesis.
Last week I was in Aosta and I seen large ex-vineyards transformed in solar arrays.
That’s no competition with food supply?
A great question from R Gates: If we could artificially control our atmosphere’s CO2 level, while gaining useable energy, what lower limit on CO2 would we choose?
Now we can talk about the optimal CO2 level. We know that too low and plants do not grow well. We know that the CO2 level has been many times higher than now at times in the past without hitting a “tipping point” turning the Earth into Venus.
My guess is that something like 500 or 600, compared to the current level in the high 300’s would be an improvement. Faster plant growth with longer growing seasons, ie more food for people, would be a good thing. Large parts of North America and Eurasia would become better farmland.
Of course the real answer would be empirical, not model or guess driven.
Crispin in Waterloo: The idea that CO is a reasonable intermediary on the way to producing liquid fuels is silly. Yes it is interesting, but it is not a viable alternative to lots of better choices. Feeding algae ponds to produce oil is far more efficient and you don’t need SASOL to come to the party.
Lots of silly ideas turn out well. Which of these technologies will scale up fastest and cut costs the most is not known now. If I had to bet now, I’d bet on concentrated PV powering the conversion of CO2 to CO and then liquid fuel.
We will probably have to create a world-wide regulatory agency to prevent the ‘Big Air’ companies from removing too much CO2. It’s just like those greedy corporations to suck out all the air and then sell us electric blankets at an exorbitant profit.
Also, the UN security forces will have to be bolstered in order to ensure security of the air supply. We must not let a C02 reduction gap reduce our national security. No war for air!
“Ian Forman 11.47am said: If only all the bright contributors to WUWT would (as I thought they claimed they could) convincingly demonstrate that CO2 emissions are only in the very slightest linked to climate change, wanted or unwanted, we’d probably hear no more such remarks “
Forget CO2. Would you accept the link between:
1. The burning of fossil fuels and their eventual depletion?
2. Drilling for oil and the occasional oil spill?
3. An oil dependent economy and the funding oil rich rogue states?
This catalyzed photosynthesis innovation, if it becomes practical*, would nicely break all three in time.
*Don’t forget water. Eventually replacing 20 million bbl per day of US hydrocarbon consumption by a synthetic scheme means three to four times that many moles of H2O has to come from somewhere. Total US tap water (non irrigation) use is about 10 million bbl per day by comparison.
“Crispin in Waterloo says:
October 7, 2011 at 1:06 pm
Feeding algae ponds to produce oil is far more efficient and you don’t need SASOL to come to the party.”
No, algae is far more efficient at producing hydrocarbons per solar flux unit than other biofuel crops, especially corn, but natural existing photosynthesis tops out on the order of 1% conversion, while photovoltaic monocrystalline Si is now at 20%; concentrated solar may allow that to climb much higher. Also algae has some well know economic hurdles that have not fallen despite intense effort: contamination by other species or sensitivity to environmental conditions in the open, or expensive closed containers.
But.. but… I don’t want to reduce CO2 plant food! We need it to feed the people. OMG think about the billions of people! Oh, the humanity! GK
Ray says:
October 7, 2011 at 1:23 pm
Some say that under about 150 ppm CO2 plant life as we know it is not sustainable
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Ray, our C3 plants would stop at around 200ppm….Rice, Wheat, Vegetables, Fruits, algae, etc
Low CO2 levels in the past more than likely helped develop the C4’s….grasses, sugarcane, corn,..etc……
And it’s the combination of the two that have kept CO2 levels low enough to be limiting ever since…….
Why in this world would anyone want to keep CO2 levels so low they are limiting to plant growth?
Great, just another company that will want loan guarantees so they could move production facilities, were they to actually reach that far, to China then declare bankruptcy. Better keep a close eye on who all is investing in this company, that’ll say a lot about what it is all about.
kwinterkorn says:
October 7, 2011 at 1:27 pm
A great question from R Gates: If we could artificially control our atmosphere’s CO2 level, while gaining useable energy, what lower limit on CO2 would we choose?
Now we can talk about the optimal CO2 level. We know that too low and plants do not grow well. We know that the CO2 level has been many times higher than now at times in the past without hitting a “tipping point” turning the Earth into Venus.
My guess is that something like 500 or 600, compared to the current level in the high 300′s would be an improvement.
====================================================================
My guess would be somewhere between 1000 ppm and 2000 ppm…..
…that’s already been shown in greenhouses
In a sane world, we would be digging that CO2 back up, and putting it in the atmosphere…
…and having conversations about keeping the levels up
No different than we do any other fertilizer that’s been sequestered……….
1) Well, duh! What did you expect?
2) Name something without risk.
3) The USA buys most of the oil it imports from Canada. I thought the Conservatives were back in power. Are they still rogue? Anyhoo, buy drilling more of our own oil and creating more refineries, we can import less.
>> “… while simultaneously reducing CO2 emissions that are linked to unwanted climate change,” Kenis said.<<
In other words, it reduces none of the CO2 emissions.
To Robert M:
Honestly. You and I and many other CAGW skeptics are probably in close agreement on most substantial issues. And R Gates believes differently. But unloading on R gates with your ad hominems is wrong. I disagree with R Gates posts mosts of the time, but I know that he is always polite and often at least poses issues in a way that could lead toward and not away from science. A blog at which everyone is in agreement would be boring and useless, like many of the pro-CAGW sites. Energetic debate, even with some pointed humor, if clever, is great fun.
Personal attacks at the level in your post above do not put you in the best light, nor the rest of us who may think this site is important, maybe even historically important. If blogging must be a bloodsport to satisfy you, surely there are other sites for that.
KW
Why re-invent the wheel? Nature does very well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chlorophyll
I’m going to drive my Suburban around all night to provide some feedstock CO2 for them.
How much environmental damage is done in the manufacture of the equipment? Is is being made to Chinese standards of environmental care, or under Western regulations (rhetorical question!)?
R. Gates says:
October 7, 2011 at 12:10 pm
Question: Suppose this scheme really did work, and energy could be economically harnessed by removing atmospheric CO2. What would a lower limit be? i.e. Would some global consensus for CO2 levels be agreed to below which we would stop using this process to get energy? It might start getting a wee bit cold if levels dropped much below 200-250 ppm.
_______________________________________________________________________
And if it drops that low you can forget about eating…..
If you are really determined to get rid of CO2 then how about pumping it into green houses to grow food (or fuel) At least that isn’t committing economic suicide.
How very idiotic. In case no one realized, carbon dioxide is where all of our food comes from. First the total stupidity of turning corn into “fuel”, now this further stupidity.
Just speaking to my wife’s cousin in Kansas today . . . the farmers are all out picking corn. Yield looks to be about 40 to 45 bushels per acre . . . as against 145 bushels per acre about 3 to 4 years ago. And she said that the stored reserves farmers store were already running out.
But if it is famine that is wanted, this is another good way of bringing it on.
I’ll generate the electricity with my perpetual motion machine. What a hoot.