Biomass Fuel Not Worth It

 
 
In our previous dispatches concerning your Cap&Trade op-ed, we mentioned the work of David Pimental, at Cornell University.
 
Herein is more documentation of his, and his UCal-Berkely collaborators', findings that most biofuel concepts, such as ethanol from corn, are neither economically sound, nor sustainable.
 
There might be a few worthwhile exceptions, one of which we'll note in our comment, following.
 
Some excerpts:

"ITHACA, N.Y. -- Turning plants such as corn, soybeans and sunflowers into fuel uses much more energy than the resulting ethanol or biodiesel generates, according to a new Cornell University and University of California-Berkeley study."

"There is just no energy benefit to using plant biomass for liquid fuel," says David Pimentel, professor of ecology and agriculture at Cornell. "These strategies are not sustainable."

"Pimentel and Tad W. Patzek, professor of civil and environmental engineering at Berkeley, conducted a detailed analysis of the energy input-yield ratios of producing ethanol from corn, switch grass and wood biomass as well as for producing biodiesel from soybean and sunflower plants. Their report is published in Natural Resources Research (Vol. 14:1, 65-76)."

"In terms of energy output compared with energy input for ethanol production, the study found that:

  • corn requires 29 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced; (much of it from coal - JtM)
  • switch grass requires 45 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced; and
  • wood biomass requires 57 percent more fossil energy than the fuel produced."
Our one qualifying comment relates to "wood biomass". We have provided documentation that cellulose - i.e., wood pulp - can be processed, perhaps as a co-feed with coal, in an appropriately-selected and designed coal-to-liquid facility, with Methanol as the end product. Methanol can be used itself as a liquid fuel, a much more potent and effective one than ethanol, and can be converted rather directly into gasoline (i.e., ExxonMobil's "MTG" technology).
 
When it comes to coal versus corn ethanol, and it's ilk, Coal is the King of the ring.

Efficient CO2 Capture

 
In further support of our thesis that Carbon Dioxide is a potentially-valuable by-product arising from our use of coal, we submit this information on research originating from the University of Calgary, Canada.
 
Herein, it's demonstrated that Carbon Dioxide can be efficiently, economically captured, even from the atmosphere itself, and thereby made available for use, such as in the documented processes whereby it can be used in the synthesis of more liquid fuel.
 
The excerpt:
 
"U of C scientist captures global-warming gas directly from the air; technology could reduce emissions from transportation
 
In research conducted at the U of C, Keith - ( David Keith, Director, ISEEE Energy and Environmental Systems Group; Canada Research Chair in Energy and the Environment, Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering and Department of Economics, University of Calgary; Adjunct Professor Department of EPP, Carnegie Mellon) - and a team of researchers showed it is possible to reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) – the main greenhouse gas that contributes to global warming –  using a relatively simple machine that can capture the trace amount of CO2 present in the air at any place on the planet.
 
The research is significant because air capture technology is the only way to capture CO2 emissions from transportation sources such as vehicles and airplanes. These so-called diffuse sources represent more than half of the greenhouse gases emitted on Earth.
 
(As we've earlier documented, natural sources, primarily the processes of volcanism, emit far more CO2 than all human activities combined - but that's not the point of this discussion. - JtM)
 
Keith and his team showed they could capture CO2 directly from the air with less than 100 kilowatt-hours of electricity per tonne of carbon dioxide. Their custom-built tower was able to capture the equivalent of about 20 tonnes per year of CO2 on a single square metre of scrubbing material – the average amount of emissions that one person produces each year in the North American-wide economy.

“This means that if you used electricity from a coal-fired power plant, for every unit of electricity you used to operate the capture machine, you’d be capturing 10 times as much CO2 as the power plant emitted making that much electricity,” Keith says."

Not explained well in this particular news release is the fact that Keith's invention uses NaOH - i.e. sodium hydroxide, lye - which reacts with CO2 to yield carbonates and bicarbonates of sodium, which, in turn, have various commercial uses.

Note that Keith's invention - it is in the process of being patented - does not, as do other CO2 reclamation technologies, lead to the synthesis of additional liquid fuels and useful organic chemicals.

It does, however, enable the commercial extraction of dilute CO2 from the atmosphere in a practical process, wherein the extraction procedure itself results in the production of end use products. It is an evolution of efficiency in Carbon Dioxide recycling.

And, it thereby enables "remote" siting, or placement, of the CO2 collection facilities. Power plants and Coal-to-Liquid facilities, for instance, would not have to undergo expensive retrofitting with new carbon capture equipment - a separate facility for that purpose could be set up nearby, or even a thousand miles away, and the extracted CO2 "assigned" to a specific power generator or CTL converter as carbon credits.

Greenhouse Gasses to Fuel

 
Baldur Eliasson, Chang-jun Liu,† and Ulrich Kogelschatz*
ABB Corporate Research Ltd, 5405 Baden, Switzerland
(ABB is a global leader in power and automation technologies that enable utility and industry customers to improve their performance while lowering environmental impact.)
 

We have documented a number of conversion processes for you involving the transmutation of greenhouse gasses, primarily Carbon Dioxide, arising from a number of natural processes, such as vulcanism, which is, perhaps, the major contributor of atmospheric CO2, and human activities, such as the combustion, or conversion-to-liquid, of coal.
 
Another suspected culprit in climate change is Methane, which arises itself from a number of sources, including decaying swampland vegetation, and is a relatively simple organic compound.
 
Without recapping past reports at too much length, we have detailed, and will in future dispatches further detail, how CO2 can be efficiently captured, even from the atmosphere itself, and then converted, when combined with a Hydrogen source, into more liquid fuel.
 
One Hydrogen source that has been documented is water, when processed via electrolysis. In the subsequent reactions, methane is a transitional product which further reacts with more CO2, via catalysis, to methanol - which can be used as a serviceable liquid fuel itself, or further converted into gasoline.
 
But, Methane can act as the original hydrogen donor for CO2-to-Hydrocarbon synthesis.
 
In the enclosed dissertation from Switzerland's ABB, we have a further explanation of the synthesis of  hydrocarbons - including a "syngas" which, as you should by now know, can be derived from coal, and is a direct precursor to liquid fuels such as methanol, diesel and gasoline - through the reaction of CO2 with methane through the mediation of a zeolite catalyst.
 
The Abstract:
 
"Direct higher hydrocarbon formation from the greenhouse gases methane and carbon dioxide using a dielectric-barrier discharge (DBD) with zeolite catalysts is presented. This catalytic DBD can be operated at ambient conditions and leads to direct hydrocarbon formation. The products include alkanes, alkenes, oxygenates, and syngas (CO + H2). The product distribution depends on the pressure, the input power, the flow rate, the CH4/CO2 feed ratio, and the catalyst used. It is not sensitive to gas temperature in the range from room temperature to 150 °C. From the experiments it can be concluded that a cogeneration of syngas and higher hydrocarbons can be achieved using the catalytic DBD. The optimum CH4/CO2 ratio in the feed for such cogeneration is in the range 2/1 to 3/1. The energy efficiency of CO2 and CH4 conversion increases substantially at higher discharge powers."
 
Unfortunately, the reaction does require more Methane than CO2, and CO2 is by far the predominant greenhouse gas. But, remember that Methane can itself be synthesized from Carbon Dioxide and water, if sufficient quantities could not be extracted from the atmosphere, or collected at sites where it's generated, such as sewage treatment plants, landfills and agricultural waste accumulations. 
 
We again assert that our use of coal generates valuable by-products, such as Carbon Dioxide, which can be used, as in this example, even when combined with another greenhouse gas, to synthesize liquid fuel.

Plastics-to-Fuel via CoalTL

 
Maoyun He, Bo Xiao, Zhiquan Hu, Shiming Liu, Xianjun Guo and Siyi Luo
School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, China
 
Mike,
 
We've documented that, along with cellulose, such as sawdust and previously-loved Intel's, some other organic materials can be converted, along with our coal, into liquid fuels and chemicals. Herein, from China - where they're establishing a secure domestic liquid fuel and chemical materials supply through an extensive coal-to-liquid industrialization program - they recognize that coal-to-liquid technology enables the reclamation and recycling of other materials, including some waste plastics.
 
The excerpt:
 

"Abstract

The catalytic steam gasification of waste polyethylene (PE) from municipal solid waste (MSW) to produce syngas (H2 + CO) with NiO/γ-Al2O3 as catalyst in a bench-scale downstream fixed bed reactor was investigated. The influence of the reactor temperature on the gas yield, gas composition, steam decomposition, low heating value (LHV), cold gas efficiency and carbon conversion efficiency was investigated at the temperature range of 700–900 °C, with a steam to waste polyethylene ratio of 1.33. Over the ranges of experimental conditions examined, NiO/γ-Al2O3 catalyst revealed better catalytic performance as a view of increasing product gas yield and of decreasing char and liquid yields in the presence of steam. Higher temperature resulted in more H2 and CO production, higher carbon conversion efficiency and product gas yield. The highest syngas (H2 + CO) content of 64.35 mol%, the highest H2 content of 36.98 mol%, and the highest CO content of 27.37 mol%, were achieved at the highest temperature level of 900 °C. Syngas produced with a H2/CO molar ratio in the range of 0.83–1.35, was highly desirable as feedstock for Fischer–Tropsch synthesis for the production of transportation fuels."

Note the conclusion that some plastic wastes, like coal, are "highly desirable as feedstock for Fischer–Tropsch synthesis for the production of transportation fuels."

 

Construction of CO2 Plant

 

Steel Guru is a trade publication serving India, Asia and the Middle East. The article explains, perhaps better than we have previously, the many benefits of producing methanol, for use as a liquid fuel, from coal.
 
We had alerted you to the Inner Mongolia CoalTL plant, but the detail in this very recent publication helps to confirm our earlier reports.
 
Some excerpts: 

"Greenhouse Gas Emissions
The well-to-wheel greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions for methanol (made from natural gas) when used as a vehicle fuel are very similar in magnitude to GHGs from using gasoline. Methanol made from coal will have similar GHG emissions if the excess carbon dioxide is sequestered. Methanol made from biomass and other renewable feedstocks will have very low GHGs or even GHG credits because emissions of methane (a strong GHG) released from these sources are reduced. Vehicles designed specifically for methanol will emit lower GHGs due to their higher efficiency compared to gasoline vehicles."
 
(So, combine coal with biomass, such as algae "fed" with coal plant emissions.) 
 
"Methanol vs. Ethanol
Methanol and ethanol have similar advantageous properties when used as a vehicle fuel. Ethanol is an excellent co-solvent for methanol when used in low-level blends. E85 FFVs could be modified easily and inexpensively (less than $100) to accept methanol either as M85 or in high-level blends with ethanol. Methanol’s higher octane than ethanol creates the opportunity for more efficient operation of E85 FFVs. Production of methanol requires less water than ethanol and avoids the “food vs. fuel” debate. Using mature technology for biomass gasification, one ton of forest thinnings removed to help prevent forest fires can be converted into 160 to 170 gallons of methanol fuel.(Conversion efficiency of coal would be even better.) By comparison, one ton of corn or other land-intensive biomass crops may someday generate 60-80 gallons of cellulosic ethanol."
 
(Again, as we've previously explained, it makes little economic/environmental sense to devote agricultural land needed for food production to crops intended for ethanol manufacture - especially when, if ethanol is wanted, it, too, can be synthesized from coal.)

The “Methanol Economy”
An immediately implementable alternative to the “Hydrogen Economy” is the “Methanol Economy” where methanol serves as an energy carrier and source for production of petrochemicals. Methanol can be produced from carbon dioxide, which can be captured at the source of fossil fuel combustion (e.g., coal power plants) (Their comment - not ours.)  or mined directly from the air, and water. All of the carbon dioxide converted to methanol is recycled, so there are zero net carbon dioxide emissions from the combustion of the methanol, and the water used as the hydrogen source can also be recycled. When nuclear or renewable energy is used to capture the carbon dioxide and produce the methanol, the net carbon dioxide emissions from producing methanol are also zero.