Power to gas - the next step

GW Johnson · 2021-09-26 13:37:46

Inadequate grid capacity if anything unforseen happens is the pathetically-obvious trouble faced in Texas. It's become common knowledge that the Feb freeze froze-up various aspects of the natural gas supply, with natural gas plants being the largest generating sector in our market energy economy.

It wasn't the windmills, and it wasn't the solar panels. Those mostly still performed at or above expectations, with some few exceptions. The frozen gas wellheads happened in large part because of the cessation of electricity for powering the heaters to keep them from freezing up. What freezes isn't the methane, it's mostly the water vapor in the raw natural gas, and to some extent the heavier hydrocarbons like the butane and propane.

The cheapest natural gas is just the raw natural gas. It costs something to chill it at the gas refinery to remove the water and the carbon dioxide. That chilling process also removes the propane and the butane. Separately, those are products you can sell. Together unseparated from each other, that's also a saleable product: LPG. Even the carbon dioxide is a saleable product, at least potentially.

The "refined" natural gas is then mostly methane, with a touch of ethane, plus some varying percentage nitrogen, and maybe (or maybe not) a touch of hydrogen. That stuff is far, far less likely to suffer from freezing. But it ain't cheap. You pay a premium for fuel of that quality.

The Lege hasn't done its job correctly in a long, long time. They haven't fixed the problem we really suffered in Feb, nor have they done a damned thing about the June capacity shortfalls prompting ERCOT to warn of blackouts again. The June thing was too many plants down simultaneously for maintenance and repairs.

That can happen in an inadequately or improperly regulated market, because NOBODY is coordinating the various components of a public utility treated as a free market. Once again, ideology does not serve us well as public policy. Doesn't matter which party's ideology.

What we in Texas have for an energy market grid works, but it so-painfully-obviously doesn't quite work well enough. There needs to be some incentive (carrot) for extra capacity, and some requirement (stick) forcing generators to provide some extra capacity. With the coming electrification of the motor fleet, that capacity has to double. Yes, DOUBLE!!! Fact of life, that, and quite inconvenient, too, ain't it?

Once all vehicle sales are electric, then in another 20 years or so, the whole motor fleet will essentially be electric. That's only 20-30 years away. That's too short a time to build all the plants and infrastructure to DOUBLE grid capacity.

Beyond that, coordination of down time for repairs and maintenance is also needed. That needs the same carrot-and-stick thing, but I am less sure (at this time) for exactly how to go about that. That's what we pay the Lege members for, and it's my considered opinion that we pay them too much, for the little that they do do. (That choice of words was deliberate, BTW.)

GW

Last edited by GW Johnson (2021-09-26 13:52:28)

SpaceNut · 2021-09-26 13:57:53

Sounds like a thermal backup was required to keep the pipes which were not designed properly for cold weather.

GW Johnson · 2021-09-26 15:50:52

They had heaters. Electric heaters. Without electricity, useless heaters. Froze-up the well head. QED.

GW

tahanson43206 · 2021-10-04 10:23:22

https://www.yahoo.com/news/plant-german … 33768.html

ALEKSANDAR FURTULA and FRANK JORDANS
Mon, October 4, 2021, 2:57 AM
WERLTE, Germany (AP) — German officials on Monday unveiled what they said is the world’s first commercial plant for making synthetic kerosene, touted as a climate-friendly fuel of the future.
Aviation currently accounts for about 2.5% of worldwide emissions of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that contributes to global warming. While other forms of transportation are increasingly being electrified, the challenge to making large, battery-powered planes is formidable.
Experts say e-fuels can help solve the problem by replacing fossil fuels without major technical modifications to the aircraft.
“The era of burning coal, oil and natural gas is drawing to a close,” Germany’s environment minister, Svenja Schulze, said at a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the new plant. “At the same time, no one should have to sacrifice the dream of flying. This is why we need alternatives to conventional, climate-harming kerosene.”
- ADVERTISEMENT -
The facility in Werlte, near Germany’s northwestern border with the Netherlands, will use water and electricity from four nearby wind farms to produce hydrogen. In a century-old process, the hydrogen is combined with carbon dioxide to make crude oil, which can then be refined into jet fuel.
Burning that synthetic kerosene releases only as much CO2 into the atmosphere as was previously removed to produce the fuel, making it “carbon neutral.”
The amount of fuel that the plant can produce beginning early next year is modest: just eight barrels a day, or about 336 gallons of jet fuel. That would be enough to fill up one small passenger plane every three weeks.

The reporter's text above contains an error.

Can anyone in NewMars catch it?

(th)

SpaceNut · 2021-10-04 18:25:54

you mean going straight from co2 to crude oil...

qty 8 for the math of a 55 gallon drum being equal to 336 gallons someone shorted the drums.

or was it the e-fuels since e which typically stands for electrical

what's funny is kerosene from oil is a climate harmer since the oil is a fossil fuel where the carbon was captured a long time ago but the synthetic which did its capture only a short time ago is different in polluting...

tahanson43206 · 2021-10-04 18:47:18

For SpaceNut re #255

Bingo! That is a mistake that a rookie reporter might make.

Per Google you can make Carbon Monoxide from Hydrogen and Carbon Dioxide.

However, most forum members would think of the Sabatier reaction, which Dr. Zubrin proposed for use on Mars to make fuel for a return flight.

Quote from Google:

Researchers produce kerosene from sunlight, CO2 and waterhttps://www.downtoearth.org.in › news › energy › rese...
Jun 14, 2019 — In a first, German researchers have used sunlight, carbon dioxide (CO2) and water to make kerosene, which has potential to revolutionise the ...

And from www.downtoearth.org...

In a first, German researchers have used sunlight, carbon dioxide (CO2) and water to make kerosene, which has potential to revolutionise the energy sector, according to German-Aerospace Centre (DLR).
In a pilot project, researchers from the ETH Zurich developed a novel technology that uses concentrated solar energy to synthesise liquid hydrocarbon fuel from water and CO2. For this product, CO2 and water are taken directly from the air and split using solar energy.
The process yields synthesis gas or syngas — a mixture of hydrogen and carbon monoxide. It is subsequently processed and converted into kerosene, methanol or other hydrocarbons.
“The demonstration of this technology could have large effects on the transport sector, especially for aviation and shipping, that will remain dependent on liquid fuels for long distances,” said Andreas Sizmann, project coordinator, in a statement issued on Thursday.
He explained that the reversal of combustion is accomplished via a high-temperature thermochemical cycle based on metal oxide redox reactions, which converts water and CO2 into energy-rich synthesis gas (syngas).

These processes are covered in detail in the book being studied in the topic
Book: Dedicated topic: Beyond Oil and Gas

So (regarding #255 about kerosene) the reporter's error missed the synthetic gas step entirely, and none of the proof readers knew enough to catch the error.

(th)

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#251 2021-09-26 13:37:46

Re: Power to gas - the next step

#252 2021-09-26 13:57:53

Re: Power to gas - the next step

#253 2021-09-26 15:50:52

Re: Power to gas - the next step

#254 2021-10-04 10:23:22

Re: Power to gas - the next step

#255 2021-10-04 18:25:54

Re: Power to gas - the next step

#256 2021-10-04 18:47:18

Re: Power to gas - the next step

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