Fuel of the Future?
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http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110331/bs_afp/spainenergyalternativeenvironmentresearch
Even though this may not happen for quite a while, what do you think? A success? Will this be accepted and allowed?
ALICANTE, Spain (AFP) – In a forest of tubes eight metres high in eastern Spain scientists hope they have found the fuel of tomorrow: bio-oil produced with algae mixed with carbon dioxide from a factory.
Almost 400 of the green tubes, filled with millions of microscopic algae, cover a plain near the city of Alicante, next to a cement works from which the C02 is captured and transported via a pipeline to the "blue petroleum" factory.
The project, which is still experimental, has been developed over the past five years by Spanish and French researchers at the small Bio Fuel Systems (BFS) company.
At a time when companies are redoubling their efforts to find alternative energy sources, the idea is to reproduce and speed up a process which has taken millions of years and which has led to the production of fossil fuels.
"We are trying to simulate the conditions which existed millions of years ago, when the phytoplankton was transformed into oil," said engineer Eloy Chapuli. "In this way, we obtain oil that is the same as oil today."
The microalgae reproduces at high speed in the tubes by photosynthesis and from the CO2 released from the cement factory.
Every day some of this highly concentrated liquid is extracted and filtered to produce a biomass that is turned into bio-oil.
The other great advantage of the system is that it is a depollutant -- it absorbs the C02 which would otherwise be released into the atmosphere.
"It's ecological oil," said the founder and chairman of BFS, French engineer Bernard Stroiazzo-Mougin, who worked in oil fields in the Middle East before coming to Spain.
"We need another five to 10 years before industrial production can start," said Stroiazzo-Mougin, who hopes to be able to develop another such project on the Portuguese island of Madeira.
"In a unit that covers 50 square kilometres, which is not something enormous, in barren regions of southern Spain, we could produce about 1.25 million barrels per day," or almost as much as the daily export of oil from Iraq, he said.
BFS, a private company, hopes to negotiate "with several countries to obtain subsidies for the installation of artificial oil fields," he said.
Other similar projects being studied in other parts of the world.
In Germany, the Swedish energy group Vattenfall last year launched a pilot project in which algae is used to absorb carbon dioxide from a coal-fired power plant.
US oil giant ExxonMobil plans to invest up to $600 million in research on oil produced from algae.
Companies, in particular those in the aeronautic sector, have shown keen interest in this research, hoping to find a replacement for classic oil.
Even though this may not happen for quite a while, what do you think? A success? Will this be accepted and allowed?
Comments
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Yeah... just read about it... .... The person/ group/ organization who can ? the code will be set for life... but then again Im sure theres endless road blocks set-up to prevent such a discovery (no conspiracy theory) not to mention all the other elements needed like funding, or some sort of operational set-up for easy production and some other ? that I cant think of at the moment... We gonna jump out of bed with the Saudi's and slowly hop into the Spaniards.
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omfg. What's wrong with using water as fuel? They got water cars in Japan!!!!!
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Salt water?
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I think this is a bad idea honestly. They are trying to create oil artificially when the present trend is to move away from usage of fossil fuels. This is like taking a very innovative step backwards.
And water is already used to make energy. However, there is a big difference between trying to power a car or even the space shuttle with water fuel cells and trying to power a city with them. -
omfg. What's wrong with using water as fuel? They got water cars in Japan!!!!!
No ... no they don't. The process to extract H2 and O2 from water then process that to produce power is amazingly inefficient. It takes a lot of energy and time to to perform the splitting process and it nets a negative power return (all things must due to thermodynamics.) It is a lot cheaper to run your car on gas. -
gas cost to damn much
if it was powered by water people wouldnt really need to go to a gas station anymore.they can just go in their back yard and turn on the hydrant
they dont want that ? to happen.i feel they should create water powerd cars -
No ... no they don't. The process to extract H2 and O2 from water then process that to produce power is amazingly inefficient. It takes a lot of energy and time to to perform the splitting process and it nets a negative power return (all things must due to thermodynamics.) It is a lot cheaper to run your car on gas.
Cheaper as in pulluting the ? planet and making it unliveable and creating massive wars?? I'm sorry, but water is way cheaper in ever way.
Oh and yes they have a water car where you can put a glass under the mufler and drink the water that comes straight out of the tailpipe.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65RkcDZxPuQ -
While the car itself would not be polluting how you get the H2 and O2 is the problem. These 'water' cars are really running on hydrogen. The process to convert H2O into its component elements is not pollutant free. This would require an enormous amount of electricity. Since this is mostly done via coal burning power plants we would still be polluting the atmosphere. Also the amount of energy required to produce enough H2 to fuel the car is considerably more than needed to extract refine and burn gas in a standard auto. Until we have cleaner forms of electricity we are stuck with gas cars.
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Cars like back to the future will be cool, stuff what you don't need like garabage as fuel lol..just kidding, but what do y'all like about the Hybrid or the technology in future in cars?
