Archived material Access restricted Article
Rantburg

Today's Front Page   View All of Tue 11/13/2007 View Mon 11/12/2007 View Sun 11/11/2007 View Sat 11/10/2007 View Fri 11/09/2007 View Thu 11/08/2007 View Wed 11/07/2007
1
2007-11-13 Science & Technology
Radical Breakthrough In 99% Efficiency Hydrogen Production
Archived material is restricted to Rantburg regulars and members. If you need access email fred.pruitt=at=gmail.com with your nick to be added to the members list. There is no charge to join Rantburg as a member.
Posted by Anonymoose 2007-11-13 09:29|| || Front Page|| [2 views ]  Top

#1 Ironically, one of the most cellulose efficient plants is the Russian Thistle, aka the Tumbleweed.

Though commercial glucose in the US is obtained almost exclusively from corn starch, this could change if a crop was desired to be specifically for starch-glucose, at a much higher density than corn.
Posted by Anonymoose 2007-11-13 09:40||   2007-11-13 09:40|| Front Page Top

#2 If something sounds too good to be true, it usually is.

What's the problem here?

1) One of the immediate applications for this technology is to supply the hydrogen that is used in fuel cell cars.... IMMEDIATE USE

2)This process produces 288 percent more energy in hydrogen than the electrical energy that is added..... IS THIS POSSIBLE? This sounds like perpetual motion. Is there a lot of other energy inputs to the system?

3)The technology is economically viable now,....SO LET'S USE IT! can we start tomorrow?
Posted by AlanC 2007-11-13 10:13||   2007-11-13 10:13|| Front Page Top

#3 The big question:

Is it SCALEABLE? It is one thing to do this in a beaker and another to do this is swimming pool sized vats.

Al

Al
Posted by Frozen Al 2007-11-13 10:24||   2007-11-13 10:24|| Front Page Top

#4 This process produces 288 percent more energy in hydrogen than the electrical energy that is added..... IS THIS POSSIBLE?

Yes. The SUN adds the remainder.
Posted by Bright Pebbles 2007-11-13 10:27||   2007-11-13 10:27|| Front Page Top

#5 This process produces 288 percent more energy in hydrogen than the electrical energy that is added..... IS THIS POSSIBLE?

Any one know what the multiplier is for Arabian oil?
Posted by Nimble Spemble 2007-11-13 10:37||   2007-11-13 10:37|| Front Page Top

#6 Bit more about the process here
Posted by tipper 2007-11-13 11:21||   2007-11-13 11:21|| Front Page Top

#7 Thanks BP, that's what I guessed since it's a bio process but while I'm not a technical illiterate when you add the "bio" prefix I get lost quickly.

This process gives me flash backs to Back to the Future 2 and the Mr. Fusion that he loads from the garbage can.

Heck, I've got enough cellulose in the form of fallen trees to keep going for quite a while.

But, where do those electron generating bacteria come from; and how large a colony(ies) do you need to get this working to scale (as mentioned)?

I'm interested in seeing the numbers for the size of the operation needed to produce enough hydrogen to power one of those city buses.

I have a picture of 3 busses, one for people and the other two for the hydrogen generating bacteria.
Posted by AlanC 2007-11-13 11:24||   2007-11-13 11:24|| Front Page Top

#8 Hopefully, it is scalable for industrial use. But we will see.
Posted by DarthVader">DarthVader  2007-11-13 11:37||   2007-11-13 11:37|| Front Page Top

#9 What about the moral issues of imprisoning innocent bacteria in "fuel cells" and torturing them with electric shocks to generate our hydrogen?????
Posted by Scooter McGruder 2007-11-13 11:54||   2007-11-13 11:54|| Front Page Top

#10 Scooter McGruder, fcuk bacteria! We are higher on the food chain!

Anyway, itsa fair trade, we provide food, they provide waste. Same as with yeast (alcohol production).
Posted by twobyfour 2007-11-13 13:11|| http://www.twobyfour.nfo/]">[http://www.twobyfour.nfo/]  2007-11-13 13:11|| Front Page Top

#11 wwaaaaaa Bacterias UNITE!

We must fight to win our freedom not fart hydrogen for the MAN!!
Posted by Red Dawg">Red Dawg  2007-11-13 13:13||   2007-11-13 13:13|| Front Page Top

#12 Damn it, if this is scalable, then please start on it pronto. I would like to see oil tick shrivelled during my lifetime!
Posted by twobyfour 2007-11-13 13:13|| http://www.twobyfour.nfo/]">[http://www.twobyfour.nfo/]  2007-11-13 13:13|| Front Page Top

#13 No torture for hydrogen!
Posted by Mike N.  2007-11-13 14:01||   2007-11-13 14:01|| Front Page Top

#14 First you need to break cellulose down to sugars and then bacteria can convert them to ethanol."

There's the catch, the same ethanol can be used as fuel directly, and what about all the "Ethanol Plants" they use the same biomass.

Can you say "Fuel Shortage", I know you can, not the alcohol, but the raw materials.
Posted by Redneck Jim 2007-11-13 14:08||   2007-11-13 14:08|| Front Page Top

#15 I would like to see oil tick shrivelled during my lifetime!

This would be a petrochemical equivalent of the Berlin Wall falling: Something I had never thought to see in my own lifetime.

In laboratory experiments, their reactor generated hydrogen gas at nearly 99 percent of the theoretical maximum yield using a[c]etic acid, a common dead-end product of glucose fermentation.

The new millennium's "acid" turns out to be vinegar instead of LSD. Who knew?

"This process produces 288 percent more energy in hydrogen than the electrical energy that is added in the process," said Bruce Logan, a professor of environmental engineering at Penn State.

Given the new high-value electrochemical capacitors that have storage values in dozens or hundreds of Farads, it should be feasible to have the electrical side of this system be totally self-regenerative, in that no external (off-vehicle) energy supply would be needed for that kick-start "jolt" to the cathode. Even an ordinary car battery might have the storage potential, although it would nice to remove that chemical lead footprint from the average vehicle. Something that the Prius in no way addresses.
Posted by Zenster">Zenster  2007-11-13 14:09||   2007-11-13 14:09|| Front Page Top

#16 "In lab experiments"

to me that rings just as true as the various DIY TV shows where the host (hostess) rebuilds WITH HIS/HER OWN TWO HANDS AN ENTIRE THREE STORY VICTORIAN IN A HALF HOUR AND NEVER BREAKS A NAIL OR GETS HER TIGHT-ASSED PANTS DUSTY.....
i call BS on this, for now anyway.
Posted by USN,Ret. 2007-11-13 14:31||   2007-11-13 14:31|| Front Page Top

#17 Stuff like this introduces the unforseen deltas that Michael Crichton talks about when he poo poos the global warming crowd. It is also the silver lining of high oil prices. Technological development is fast and furious. Effective alternative energy sources are going to be developed. And then the House of Saud (spit) will sink like a lead balloon.
Posted by remoteman 2007-11-13 14:54||   2007-11-13 14:54|| Front Page Top

#18 Redneck, either you or I misread that article.

You seem to be saying that the "fuel" for the process is ethanol. I read it that the alternate biomass process produces ethanol through fermentation but this process doesn't.

If this process relies on producing ethanol, how does that square the two statements....
1)The technology is economically viable now
and...
2)economical ethanol from cellulose is 10 years down the road,"????
Posted by AlanC 2007-11-13 15:21||   2007-11-13 15:21|| Front Page Top

#19 The AFP article had the science somewhat garbled so its not easy to say what is going on here.

However, a process that produces hydrogen is, other things equal, better than a process that produces ethanol.

Hydrogen burns cleaner and is probably easier to transport since it could be moved in existing pipelines (with some modification of the pipelines); whereas ethanol is such a good solvent that it realy needs its own pipelines.
Posted by mhw">mhw  2007-11-13 17:09|| http://hypocrisy-incorporated.blogspot.com/]">[http://hypocrisy-incorporated.blogspot.com/]  2007-11-13 17:09|| Front Page Top

#20 Grant money hype.
Posted by Phinater Thraviger 2007-11-13 17:10||   2007-11-13 17:10|| Front Page Top

#21 It is also the silver lining of high oil prices. Technological development is fast and furious.

Word, remoteman. If it takes $5.00 per gallon gasoline prices to get America off of the oil tit once and for all time, then bring it on!

It goes beyond ironic that the current war on Islamic terrorism is consuming the same vast amounts of money that we should be using to get off of the oil tit. It is almost as if Islam is waging this war to distract us from the more vital goal of overcoming our dependence on OPEC exports.
Posted by Zenster">Zenster  2007-11-13 17:16||   2007-11-13 17:16|| Front Page Top

#22 Here is the press release from which the 288% comes.

Here is a bit about how it would be used in transportation:

For those who think that a hydrogen economy is far in the future, Logan suggests that hydrogen produced from cellulose and other renewable organic materials could be blended with natural gas for use in natural gas vehicles.

"We drive a lot of vehicles on natural gas already. Natural gas is essentially methane," says Logan. "Methane burns fairly cleanly, but if we add hydrogen, it burns even more cleanly and works fine in existing natural gas combustion vehicles."
Posted by Nimble Spemble 2007-11-13 17:36||   2007-11-13 17:36|| Front Page Top

#23 hydrogen.... Think Hindenberg.
Posted by Dino Spanter8758 2007-11-13 19:02||   2007-11-13 19:02|| Front Page Top

#24 #18: Redneck, either you or I misread that article.


Ummm, I read it as first making ethanol from biomass (Same biomass needed for ethanol production in the first place), then converting the ethanol to hydrogen, Wrong?
Posted by Redneck Jim 2007-11-13 20:54||   2007-11-13 20:54|| Front Page Top

#25 You hoo, Professor, I'd like to finish eating my subs in class, plus change my PSU Sub Shop order to ten Philly Cheesesteak subs wid works to go, please,ala FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH + SEAN PENN's PIZZA. *D *** NG IT, SO MUCH HYDROGEN, NOT ENUFF PROVOLONE - theme from DRAGNET here.
Posted by JosephMendiola 2007-11-13 21:52||   2007-11-13 21:52|| Front Page Top

#26 Time to [once again] be a good BEAU GESTE-IAN French Foreign Legionaire soldat like PEPE LE PEU and uncaringly obliviously smoke a good cigarette - NO, THE CRIPPLED RUSS BABE FROM "THE SOPRANOS"???
Posted by JosephMendiola 2007-11-13 21:56||   2007-11-13 21:56|| Front Page Top

23:20 JosephMendiola
23:19 CrazyFool
23:17 Don Vito Shens6025
23:13 JosephMendiola
22:57 JosephMendiola
22:51 JosephMendiola
22:49 Zhang Fei
22:49 Eric Jablow
22:39 JosephMendiola
22:24 JosephMendiola
22:24 Redneck Jim
22:17 JosephMendiola
22:12 JosephMendiola
22:04 Redneck Jim
22:01 Rob Crawford
21:56 JosephMendiola
21:55 trailing wife
21:54 Redneck Jim
21:52 JosephMendiola
21:51 Phaigum Untervehr4039
21:47 JosephMendiola
21:47 Redneck Jim
21:43 Wholuque Gonque5344
21:42 trailing wife









Paypal:
Google
Search WWW Search rantburg.com