Making Gasoline a Renewable Fuel?!?

Started by Red1530 June 17th, 2008 12:49 PM
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Would you be willing to pay $4 per gallon if this process was used?

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I read in this months Popular Science article called "10 Audacious Ideas to Save the Planet". In it the third idea caught my attention. That idea uses the carbon dioxide in the air and hydrogen to make a number of conventional fuels including gasoline. However the because of the current cost of the technology, the price of gas would have to stay above $4 per gallon to be economical.

Source: http://www.popsci.com/environment/article/2008-06/10-audacious-ideas-save-planet?page=2
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Kratos_Aurion88

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I wouldn't, mostly because even though gasoline would be renewable, the effects of burning fossil fuels would still hurt the environment.
That's a good point, but if it became a renewable resource, then we'd most likely curtail future drilling, therefore helping the environment. Desperate humans can do very stupid things.
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Kratos_Aurion88

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If it's being constantly recycled, the environment simply doesn't come into matters.
Actually the emmisions from the fuel would still be a factor..,
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Actually the emmisions from the fuel would still be a factor..,
Yes, if my chemistry is right, then the one of the products from the combustion will always be CO2, which harms the atmosphere if there's enogh in it.
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Psh, I already pay four dollars a gallon for gas; if this new one helps the environment, I'll be more than willing to continually pay that particular amount. Even though it'll still probably harm the environment somewhat, with everybody in the world using it, a difference could be made.

It's easier said than done, though.

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Yes, if my chemistry is right, then the one of the products from the combustion will always be CO2, which harms the atmosphere if there's enogh in it.
Which could be recycled once more right? But the issue then is what do with the other products of gasoline combustion, since it isn't a chemical that burns with 100% efficiency (at least in car engines iirc), so consequently there are other chemicals that will float about in our atmosphere.

Ethanol should really be considered as viable fuel source though, since it burns much cleaner and is renewable. The only issue would be how to produce it :/
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Which could be recycled once more right? But the issue then is what do with the other products of gasoline combustion, since it isn't a chemical that burns with 100% efficiency (at least in car engines iirc), so consequently there are other chemicals that will float about in our atmosphere.

Ethanol should really be considered as viable fuel source though, since it burns much cleaner and is renewable. The only issue would be how to produce it :/
I've got to disagree with you in someways on the ethanol issue. I currently don't agree with it because of the negative impact is has on the economy, now correct me if I'm wrong, but because corn is a major ingredient in ethanol, many farmers are now switching to producing corn for the 'cash crop' aspect rather than consumer goods such as wheat, which causes products with wheat in it to rise in price. Now I do note ethanol is definitely better for the enviroment and would be a good option for keeping gas prices down if the government finds someway to regulate the production of corn so that the prices of wheat based products amoung others stays down.

Hopefully that made some sense to someone. I always feel as though I'm rambling. Oh well.

Kratos_Aurion88

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...and these gas prices aren't negatively impacting the economy? Would you rather pay a quarter more for bread or a dollar more for gasoline?
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I'm not sure how the exchange rate works exactly here, but here in England we pay £10 for about 10 litres i think? Something like that, I think that is a gallon right?

Anyway, I would like to see vehicles that run off water, since this is a reproductable element which would be clean and efficient if used to its most effective measure. It's either that or we should all ride Flinstone carts and use our legs to move around.
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I'm not sure how the exchange rate works exactly here, but here in England we pay £10 for about 10 litres i think? Something like that, I think that is a gallon right?

Anyway, I would like to see vehicles that run off water, since this is a reproductable element which would be clean and efficient if used to its most effective measure. It's either that or we should all ride Flinstone carts and use our legs to move around.
Actually 1 U.S. Gallon of gas is equivilent to 3.785 litres in the UK. and if we look at today's exchange rate: (Wednesday, June 18, 2008) 4 US Dollar(s) = 2.5836 Euro(s) It looks roughly like you are paying more,but My math may be off.

either way I'd much rather be driving along in a hydrogen hybrid car which produces only water as emmisions. the only thing stopping this course is the fact that there would have to be a lot of new Hydrogen stations built around to grab Hydrogen from the air.
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Actually 1 U.S. Gallon of gas is equivilent to 3.785 litres in the UK. and if we look at today's exchange rate: (Wednesday, June 18, 2008) 4 US Dollar(s) = 2.5836 Euro(s) It looks roughly like you are paying more,but My math may be off.
First you'd best take another look at our currency, it's pounds and pence, not euros and cents. The petrol and diesel prices here fall anywhere between £1.05 to £1.99 per litre from what I've seen. $4 is definitely worth more than £1.50.

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Wow! This is a really cool topic!

In respect for the the thread, I would say that I would definitely pay $4 a gallon for gasoline if technology became available to make it renewable. However, I doubt it would cost so little an amount of money. The process would no doubt be elaborate, as the broken-down components of spent gasoline would first have to be collected and re-combined (which is possible, mind you). This would require enormous amounts of energy, as the amount of energy needed to re-combine the components of the gasoline would have to equal the amount of energy released as the gasoline burns.

To give you an idea of how much energy that actually is, think of it this way: our current combustion engines are at best about 30% efficient in the use of fuel. That means only three-tenths of the energy created in the burning of the gas goes into moving the car. The rest is lost mostly to heat and friction in the moving parts of the car. Now: cars can get along pretty well on that measly 30%: imagine what they could do if engines were 80 or 90% efficient. That same amount of energy would be necessary to remake the spent fuel.

So it's a great idea, but it's a bit impractical. It would just be too elaborate and expensive a project to try to reclaim fuel. I think the better direction to go would be to create more efficient engines to fully harness the energy of the fuel. I'm a bit biased though, as I'm going to be a Mechanical Engineer once I graduate from college ^^

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I believe the easiest way to find a fuel for cars and such to help the environment would be Hydrogen fuel cells. I'm not sure how far off the technology is for it becoming a staple in car design, but I believe that it is the responsibility of the world's major car manufacture companies to full fund their R&D departments into undertaking the research to make it possible. All that would come out of the exhaust would be water, and it is a much more efficient and hassle-free method than using electric motors.

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I've got to disagree with you in someways on the ethanol issue. I currently don't agree with it because of the negative impact is has on the economy, now correct me if I'm wrong, but because corn is a major ingredient in ethanol, many farmers are now switching to producing corn for the 'cash crop' aspect rather than consumer goods such as wheat, which causes products with wheat in it to rise in price. Now I do note ethanol is definitely better for the enviroment and would be a good option for keeping gas prices down if the government finds someway to regulate the production of corn so that the prices of wheat based products amoung others stays down.

Hopefully that made some sense to someone. I always feel as though I'm rambling. Oh well.
That makes perfect sence. A Failproof way, would be to use hydrogen cars, which wont affect other stuff much. The only thing would be that the Cars themselves would be very expensive and research on these cars are little.

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That makes perfect sence. A Failproof way, would be to use hydrogen cars, which wont affect other stuff much. The only thing would be that the Cars themselves would be very expensive and research on these cars are little.
The problem is that the hydrogen must be compressed to retain its liquid form, which allows vehicles to carry more of it and go more than a few miles on a refill. Hydrogen in general explodes on contact with air, and if you compress it it becomes very deadly should the car get in an accident.
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I wouldn't, mostly because even though gasoline would be renewable, the effects of burning fossil fuels would still hurt the environment.
Actually, I feel that this whole Global Warming thing is just a way for Al Gore to make some quick money. CO2 makes up about 0.02% of the atmosphere and is too insignificant to harm the enviornment. I believe that it is a natural cycle of warm and cool periods. (if it were not, how could vikings plant grapes in Greenland in 1000, before anyone had any concept of a self propeled car?) Ethanol is counnter productive, as it takes more energy to create it that it supplies. Anyone can pm me if you want to debate it.
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txteclipse

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Actually, I feel that this whole Global Warming thing is just a way for Al Gore to make some quick money. CO2 makes up about 0.02% of the atmosphere and is too insignificant to harm the enviornment. I believe that it is a natural cycle of warm and cool periods. (if it were not, how could vikings plant grapes in Greenland in 1000, before anyone had any concept of a self propeled car?) Ethanol is counnter productive, as it takes more energy to create it that it supplies. Anyone can pm me if you want to debate it.
I actually agree with you on that one. The atmosphere fluctuates a couple of degrees at most over a substantial period of time and Al Gore starts becoming apocalyptic. It's really just to get people to develop programs to counter the made-up problem: programs that make him filthy rich.

However, we are faced with a real "inconvenient truth," and that is that we're running low on fossil fuel. Not low enough to justify current gas prices (another get-rich-quick scheme on the part of gasoline companies), but still low enough to cause us to want to plan for the future. I think the future is hydrogen power, electric power, or a combination between the two. It's just that bugs need to be worked out of these respective technologies.
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I actually agree with you on that one. The atmosphere fluctuates a couple of degrees at most over a substantial period of time and Al Gore starts becoming apocalyptic. It's really just to get people to develop programs to counter the made-up problem: programs that make him filthy rich.

However, we are faced with a real "inconvenient truth," and that is that we're running low on fossil fuel. Not low enough to justify current gas prices (another get-rich-quick scheme on the part of gasoline companies), but still low enough to cause us to want to plan for the future. I think the future is hydrogen power, electric power, or a combination between the two. It's just that bugs need to be worked out of these respective technologies.
We wouldn't be running low if the enviornmentalists would let us drill off shore and in the ANWR. I'm also not totally convinced that the high gas prices are because of a lack of oil, but are a result of inflation. Unfortunatly, the liberal media is only showing us the enviornmentalist side ofthe issue.
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I found out yesterday, that it's roughly 4.5 or 4.6 litres that is equivalent to a 'British' gallon. So it's about £5 British pounds for a gallon.

Fuel economy depends on how you drive more than what you drive. It's proven that you could drive a big engined BMW more economically than a Hybrid. They did it on Top Gear :P
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