From Sugar To Gasoline

[Edstock]

From Science Daily:

 

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/...80918170827.htm

 

Following independent paths of investigation, two research teams are announcing this month that they have successfully converted sugar-potentially derived from agricultural waste and non-food plants-into gasoline, diesel, jet fuel and a range of other valuable chemicals.

 

The key to the breakthrough is a process developed by both Dumesic and Cortright called aqueous phase reforming. In passing a watery slurry of plant-derived sugar and carbohydrates over a series of catalysts-materials that speed up reactions without sacrificing themselves in the process-carbon-rich organic molecules split apart into component elements that recombine to form many of the chemicals that are extracted from non-renewable petroleum.

 

It's just another small advance, but over time, they add up.

[Pioneer]

I like this paragraph best.

 

As part of a suite of second generation biofuel alternatives, green gasoline approaches like aqueous phase reforming are generating interest across the academic and industrial communities because they yield a product that is compatible with existing infrastructure, closer than many other alternatives in their net energy yield, and most importantly, can be crafted from plants grown in marginal soils, like switchgrass, or from agricultural waste.

 

Can be used by existing infrastructure, and is produced from waste. Can't get any better than that.

[xr7g428]

Although I believe that the action of CO2 in global warming is not well enough understood to drive policy decisions, the output product of this process is carbon neutral, as well.

 

We are very close to creating synthetic fuels in a number of different ways. Once we grasp the idea that petroleum is just so much hydrogen being bound together with carbon, the number of possible equivalents is almost boundless. Whether we use electrolysis, to liberate hydrogen and carbon from H2O and CO2, or bio-forming in the form of algae or other plant life, to do the same thing, the result is the raw material for energy. To be able to use our current infrastructure trumps just about every other approach.

[sprinter]

I like this paragraph best.

 

 

 

Can be used by existing infrastructure, and is produced from waste. Can't get any better than that.

 

 

It is time to bring back hemp. That is the way Henry Ford envisioned it.

[theripper]

there are a LOT of smart people in this country working on alternative fuels. it's only a matter of time. oil will not always be our main fuel soure, and when it's pushed to the background, we'll be a stronger country for it.

 

for all the flack that the US takes for falling behind in the technology race, it's good to hear that we're still in the game.