Information Bridge: DOE Scientific and Technical Information - - Document #6701984
We recently made report, now published by the West Virginia Coal Association as: 1915 CO2 Recycling | Research & Development | News; of a technology wherein Carbon Monoxide could be produced, on an industrial basis, by reacting Carbon Dioxide with hot Coal.
In the course of that report, we also included information concerning: "United States Patent: H000243 ; United States Patent H243 - Hydrocarbons from Carbon Monoxide and Water;1987; Assignee: The United States of America", wherein it was demonstrated by a group of USDOE scientists, at the Brookhaven, NY, National Laboratory, that a low-Hydrogen content synthesis gas, as might be obtained by reacting hot Coal with Carbon Dioxide, could be reacted with, or supplemented by, Steam, plain old H2O; and, it's ratio of Hydrogen to Carbon thereby adjusted, to make the synthesis gas more amenable for catalytic condensation into desired hydrocarbons.
One of the USDOE scientists named among the inventors in that patent is one Richard Sapienza; and, we see herein, via the initial link and attached file in this dispatch, that Sapienza had been at work developing Carbon Dioxide recycling, and related, technologies, for the United States Department of Energy, for at least a decade prior to issuance of USP H243.
Comment follows very brief excerpts from a technical paper, which, as the link reveals, was first published by the USDOE in June of 1978; and, then, later presented more publicly at the "Symposium on Advances in Synthetic Fuels", sponsored by the American Chemical Society at their September, 1978, Miami Beach, FL, meeting:
"An FeTi Methanation Catalyst
James R. Lynch, Len D. Spaulding, and Richard S . Sapienza
Brookhaven National Laboratory, NY
June, 1978
Abstract: The intermetallic compound FeTi was found to catalyze the reduction of CO and CO2 to methane by hydrogen. CO reduction yielded traces of ethane as did CO2; in addition, CO2 reduction yielded small amounts of methanol.
The reduction of both CO and CO2 yield methane at a rate which is directly proportional to time (and) the rate of CH4 production from CO2 is about 10 times greater than that observed in CO reduction.
In summary, a new intermetallic methanation catalyst, FeTi, has been found."
------------
The full report is detailed beyond our ability to summarize and distill in a less technical way.
And, in point of fact, the production rates, of Methane and Methanol, from Carbon Dioxide, don't at first appear all that encouraging.
However, the use of combined Iron and Titanium catalyst greatly reduced the energy required to effect the reaction; with experimental results suggesting that a cycle-recycle loop could be established within the reactor, to effect a more complete conversion of Carbon Dioxide into either, as preferred, Methane or Methanol.
Note, too, that with the catalysts specified by the USDOE, it was more productive to convert Carbon Dioxide than to convert the presumably more reactive Carbon Monoxide - which we could make, in any case, as we've thoroughly documented, by passing Carbon Dioxide over red hot Coal.
Further, herein is additional confirmation of the fact that we can make Methane from Carbon Dioxide.
And, we remind you: Once we have such Methane, made from Carbon Dioxide, we can react that Methane with even more Carbon Dioxide, as in the "tri-reforming", and related, technologies explained best for us so far, as we've earlier documented, by Penn State University; and, through such reforming reactions, synthesize liquid hydrocarbons and other products, including more Methanol.
Methanol, to reiterate, can then, through multiple known processes, be further converted into Gasoline.