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Exxon Recycles By-Product CO2 to Methanol

United States Patent: 6495609

 

This is might be a repeat of an earlier submission, which we present with regrets for possible duplication caused by our personal circumstances.

Certainly, it resonates with familiarity relative to many other of our reports documenting the suite of Carbon Dioxide recycling technologies that has been developed by the companies that became ExxonMobil, as for one example, seen in:

Exxon Patents CO2 Recycling | Research & Development | News; which details:

"Conversion of methane, carbon dioxide and water using microwave radiation - Patent 5266175; 1993; Assignee: Exxon Research & Engineering"; and, wherein is disclosed how Carbon Dioxide, Methane and Water can be converted together into a hydrocarbon synthesis gas suitable for catalytic condensation into liquid fuels.

 

Herein, we see that Exxon applied themselves further to Carbon Dioxide utilization, and did so with specific application to one industrial process that generates large amounts of CO2 as a by-product; and which might have special interest to Exxon since it is an industrial process which makes plastics out of petrochemicals.

Comment follows excerpts from:

"United States Patent 6,495,609 - Carbon Dioxide Recovery in ... Ethylene Oxide Production

Date: December, 2002

Inventor: Ronald Searle, Houston

Assignee: ExxonMobil Chemical Patents, Inc., Texas

Abstract: Disclosed is a method for recovering carbon dioxide from an ethylene oxide production process and using the recovered carbon dioxide as a carbon source for methanol synthesis. More specifically, carbon dioxide recovered from an ethylene oxide production process is used to produce a syngas stream. The syngas stream is then used to produce methanol.

This invention relates to recovering carbon dioxide from an ethylene oxide production process. In particular this invention relates to recovering carbon dioxide from an ethylene oxide production process and using the recovered carbon dioxide to produce methanol.

In the production of ethylene oxide 20-25% of the ethylene feed is oxidized into carbon dioxide and water instead of ethylene oxide. The loss of large quantities of ethylene and the environmental concerns in purging carbon dioxide into the environment has lead to attempts at minimizing the amount of carbon dioxide produced during the ethylene oxide production process. 

Most of these efforts have concentrated on the selection of inhibitors and catalysts to increase ethylene oxide selectivity.

Instead of limiting the production of carbon dioxide during the ethylene oxide production process, the present invention provides for recovering the carbon dioxide. The recovered carbon dioxide is then used to produce methanol."

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We'll keep our excerpts brief, not only since this might be a repetition, but, since the point is clearly made:

"carbon dioxide recovered from an (industrial) process is used to produce ... methanol."

ExxonMobil, we again remind you, owns the "MTG"(r) technology, which enables the conversion of Methanol, as herein synthesized from Carbon Dioxide, into Gasoline.

And, as ExxonMobil herein seems to say, it makes a lot more sense to, "instead of limiting the production of carbon dioxide", through economy-crippling taxation measures, we can recover CO2, wherever and however it's generated, and then use it "to produce methanol".