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SpaceNut

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From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,428

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

biggest reduction in CO2 emissions during the past 15 years (over 60%) has come from switching from coal to natural gas.

chemical equation of combustion of source fuel.

All none fuel energy sources would have an even lower as there is a limited combustion used to make the item.

Void

Member

Registered: 2011-12-29

Posts: 7,773

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

Just stopping off, because of Spacenuts post.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/a … r%20CO%202.
Quote:

Performance investigation of adding clean hydrogen to natural gas for better sustainability
Author links open overlay panelH.IshaqaI.Dincerab

Quote:

Although natural gas is cleaner than other fossil fuels, adding hydrogen to the natural gas makes it much cleaner and more environmental friendly. The blends of natural gas and hydrogen helps increase the combustion efficiency, decrease oxygen and reduce the emissions, in particular CO 2.
Author: H. Ishaq, I. Dincer, I. Dincer
Publish Year: 2020

So, this looks like it could help a bit, and would perhaps be simpler than creating a Hydrocarbon fuel from electric power.

I wonder if it could also have application on Mars.

Another article about pipeline mixed gasses: https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy13osti/51995.pdf

Done.

Last edited by Void (2022-07-10 08:08:00)

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tahanson43206

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Registered: 2018-04-27

Posts: 19,263

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

For Void re #27

Thanks ** very ** much for finding and posting this idea. 

At first reading, I am guessing/hoping that this idea represents a way of transporting hydrogen that is superior to trying to ship it by itself.

For all ... please add to this topic, if you find articles or links that can add detail.

Update after a first scan of https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy13osti/51995.pdf

I had not realized blends of hydrogen and natural gas have been in use in the United States for many decades, and are still in use in Hawaii.

The document contains numerous warnings that adding hydrogen to methane increases risks.

The document also differentiates between transmission line blends, and distribution services to occupied areas.

(th)

kbd512

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Registered: 2015-01-02

Posts: 7,825

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

SpaceNut,

I was never a manager of people unless forced to become one, and have zero desire to start, but I've been a manager of resources now for quite some time.  My job is to manage the flows of materials devoted to specific manufacturing tasks.

Warren Buffett said some time ago that the only reason to build wind turbines was to collect the government subsidies.

Now, how are presented figures used to "lie" to us?:

Life-cycle energy analysis of wind turbines – an assessment of the effect of size on energy yield

3.0MW wind turbine

Initial Embodied Energy: 84,237GJ
Recurring Embodied Energy: 7,939GJ
Embodied Energy per MW of output: 30,725GJ

1GJ = 0.27777MWh

84,237GJ * 0.27777MWh/GJ = 23,398.5MWh

Now see their not-so-clever "trick", or "magical thinking" for the wind turbine's yearly output:

Gross annual output: 32,915MWh
Net annual output: 29,743MWh <- From a 3MW wind turbine with a 33% capacity factor
Specific yield: 4.675MWh/m^2

I'm curious to know how they arrived at that figure, unless the wind turbine produces over 100% of its rated output at all times.

3MW (nameplate turbine capacity) * 8,760 (hours per year) = 26,280MWh (wind turbine runs at 100% of its rated capacity at all times and there are no losses of any kind)

Now let's deal with ugly objective reality (the world you and I have to live in, even if someone's brain does some "magical thinking" along the way):

3MW * 8,760hrs * 0.36% (US onshore wind capacity factor average) = 9,460.8MWh per year

9,460.8MWh/year * 20 years = 189,216MWh <- 6.3 years of operation at their presented "net output figure"

Looks pretty good so far, but we seem to be missing the power required to make the next new wind turbine and annual maintenance.

23,398.5MWh * 2 (the initial turbine plus its replacement 20 years later) = 46,797MWh

2,205MWh recurring maintenance embodied energy

189,216MWh - 46,797MWh - 2,205MWh = 140,214MWh (total lifetime net energy output, assuming it lasts for 20 years)

140,214MWh / 9,460.8MWh/year = 14.8 years of useful energy production

What does this embodied energy analysis clearly not include?

1. Energy for transporting the components to the construction sites

This is going to be at least another 20% on top of construction unless the wind turbine factory is co-located with its construction site, which is functionally never the case.

2. Energy for clearing the construction sites of vegetation or obstructions

A small amount relative to the total, but it all adds up.

3. Energy for the roads leading to the construction sites

Wind Systems Magazine - Successful Wind Farms Start Underground

Pavement Interactive - Energy and Road Construction-What's the Mileage of Roadway?

A 1km long 1-lane road is 775.1MWh of embodied energy (the "23,000 gallons of gasoline" referenced in the article).  If you need 50km of roadway out to the construction site and inside the site to prevent heavily laden semi-trucks from getting stuck and possibly damaging delicate wind turbine blades or towers, that's 38.755GWh (775.1MWh/km * 50km).  Raw materials are 75% of that total, 20% for transportation to the construction site, and only 5% for the roadway construction job itself.  Take note of the picture with the blacktop next to the wind turbines in the Wind Systems Magazine article.  That's how we do it here in Texas, because it works.

Could you instead transport wind turbine components using US Army tracked vehicles with special jacking gear to keep the load level and supported?  Probably, but then your vehicles travel at 20kmh, maximum.  Semi-trucks on blacktop travel at 100kmh.  Construction would take 5X more time, but the embodied energy cost is much much lower.  Why is that not already being done?  You have to pay the workers.  It's cheaper and faster to build the roads, because the roads are built using fossil fuels.

4. Energy to eventually recycle the components, which exceeds production from virgin materials, which is why only virgin materials are used

All of the manufacturers of photovoltaics and wind turbines say that the only way recycling will become mandatory is when they run out of virgin materials or government mandate forces them to, because it will never become more cost-effective (use less energy).

5. Energy for all the grid upgrades required to deal with the massive power surges

This is one of the least-appreciated aspects of mandating the use of unreliable energy.  You need massive over-capacity in all the transformer equipment to avoid grid destruction.  The embodied energy in the facilities and equipment used is enormous.

If you include all of that "unimportant" stuff listed above, then 50% of a wind turbine's total life cycle output is required for fabrication / installation / eventual replacement since every man-made object built has to be replaced at some point with a new one.  All the grid infrastructure doesn't last forever, either, and those are replaced at least as often in actual practice.

If you include any type of energy storage system using batteries (the real electro-chemical variety, rather than the imaginary "liquid solar" / "liquid brainfart" / "liquid I can't do math" variety), then you may never see any energy payback at all, because all of your output is tied up in generating energy.  This naturally assumes zero net increase in total energy consumption, zero fossil fuels are consumed to make the second generation equipment, and a lot of other equally bad assumptions.

Photovoltaics are worse than wind turbines on every metric outlined aove, and have also become the #1 form of toxic electronic waste.

So, you have some questions to answer for yourself:

1. Does it seem feasible to devote 50% (wind tubines) or more (photovoltaics) of your energy supply to producing energy, before any form of energy storage is taken into account, and before a net gain in output is achieved?  Is Warren Buffett ignorant, or does he have a standing army of people working for him who can do basic math?

2. If at least 50% of the energy to operate wind turbines at meaningful scale is devoted to making more of them and maintaining the existing copies, then how much surplus energy do you have for any other purpose?

3. If this appears to be a "winning proposition" to people with "green dreams", then what will any mistakes that they actually acknowledge look like?

From my viewpoint, this looks an awful lot like a "too big to fail" operation from the word "go".

SpaceNut

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From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,428

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

Oil and other hydrocarbons have been building for possibly a billion years collecting the solar energy and converting possibly bacterium by which to concentrate form we are making use; of after much work to extract it.

I would look at the comparison of the embodied energy of what it takes to create an oil drilling rig, the derrick, many be the pipelines, the oil distillery. the delivery trucks ect for the complete picture of the energy as we know that most of it last maybe 10 years at best.

Part of my days working has to do with others in supervisory conditions but more of extra eyes for tasks to be completed plus training or teaching of software or programs to others. Helping others to do problem solving from what they know and how the programs can fill in blanks.

kbd512

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Registered: 2015-01-02

Posts: 7,825

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

SpaceNut,

Oil rigs do not last for 10 years.  Seriously, go learn something about the business before passing judgement.  Jack-up offshore oil rigs have an average age of 32 years.  Statements like that are what "throwing crap at the wall" looks like.  You can't approach every problem from a point of ignorant ideology.

SpaceNut

Administrator

From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,428

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

Reading the incomplete sentence that only had 1 data point between the trucks not even lasting 10 years and the rigs lasting 32 then on average we are about the same. Of course, some things last longer than others but taking everything in average we are about the same embodied energy...

kbd512

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Registered: 2015-01-02

Posts: 7,825

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

SpaceNut,

Trucks last the same length of time no matter what they transport, wind turbine blades, oil, food, doesn't matter.  Get real.

Edit:

Oh, BTW, you need a lot more trucks to transport batteries, solar panels, wind turbines, as compared to oil.

Double Fail.  Try again.

Last edited by kbd512 (2022-07-10 17:39:41)

SpaceNut

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From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,428

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

Life span of a trailer or container

From literature I've seen from the trucking industry: Average trailer in non-intermodal service (always being pulled by a truck) is 8 years Average reefer trailer in non-intermodal service is 5 years Add 2-3 years to each of the above if it commonly is used in intermodal service

https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-avera … -rig-truck
Most manufacturers have a design target life in the neighborhood of 10 years and 1.2 million miles

Batteries might last the 10 year mark
Solar panels might last 20
Wind turbines might be 10 depending on location.

all things considered we can make things last long if we maintain them as well as safe guard there use.

kbd512

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Posts: 7,825

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

SpaceNut,

Most diesel truck engines get rebuilt 3 or 4 times, and then go another several million miles when the environmentalists don't successfully regulate them out of existence.  Those of us who understand embodied energy know that the best way to cut down on energy usage is to stop making new things that never last as long as the old things did.  It's routine for continuously used diesel engines to last for about 30 years before the block or head cracks.  Most of the light duty diesel trucks last for about 20 years.

Batteries might last 10 years with light usage / low total discharge, but they won't provide the same performance 10 years later, and the environment can degrade them much more rapidly than a combustion engine.

16 of my 78 solar panels are not producing electricity, their electronics failed within the first year of operation, and there are no replacement parts months later.

kbd512

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Posts: 7,825

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

There are around 5.3 million passenger vehicle accidents each year, and aobut 18% of those are totaled.  That means 954,000 cars are totaled each year.  Over 10 years, that's 9.54 million cars.  Since each EV contains an embodied energy roughly 3 times that of a gasoline powered car, that's 3X more energy lost, equivalent to 28.62 million vehicles.  There are around 276 million registered vehicles in the US, so that represents an embodied energy loss equivalent to about 10% of the total current fleet over a 10 year period, or 1% per year.  Maybe EVs will have fewer accidents using improved driver aids like Tesla's AutoPilot, but with dramatically more horsepower available, I kinda doubt it.  My evidence is all the wrecked Dodge Demons and Hellcats and Corvettes sitting in the wrecking yards.  Give the average driver a car with 2X to 3X more horsepower than what he or she presently drives, and you'll have a lot more wrecks and total losses.  This should not be surprising.  Speed kills, and we've known that for quite some time.  That's why I advocated for cars with sane amounts of horsepower.

SpaceNut

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From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,428

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

Sorry to hear about the failed solar panels that died early in life due to improper handling on install and heat exposure for the electrical overstress, all 16 should be replaced under warranty.

The fact that they are semiconductor technology means that, even a 3 to 30v static charge to the panel's connection could have caused them to fail. They needed to be install still covered until fully connect to prevent this from happening. Normally the connection would stay grounded together until connections are made.

I agree that we need to get way more life out of the stuff we make and use and that means not buying the latest and greatest craze just because the company that makes the software keeps trying to improve it.

So back to the topic of producing synthetic fuel.

It would seem that solar concentrating is part of the answer in thermal energy input.

as far as used vehicles I am lucky to have gotten the fuel saving 2007 Prius as compared to the 2005 ford escape
It will have paid for its purchase by the end of the year in fuel cost savings. I am trying to watch the vehicle for wear issues.
I did notice recently while using the AC on the car that the traction battery takes a beating on its max setting so will try to not use unless completely necessary.

kbd512

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Registered: 2015-01-02

Posts: 7,825

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

SpaceNut,

I'm not worried about the solar panels.  I had no expectation that they would last very long.  I set expectations low, so if they're ever exceeded then I'm pleasantly surprised.  My point is that the equipment doesn't last as long as the marketing claims.  That goes for anyone's equipment, combustion engine, photovoltaic panel, toaster oven, car, doesn't matter.  They're deliberately designed to fail just outside the warranty period if they even last that long.

My overriding point is that all marketing claims about how long something lasts are nonsense until proven otherwise, and all assertions about "the future" deserve to be taken with more salt than you can find on the Bonneville Flats.

I know how long a Cummins 6BT lasts because we have truckloads of historical data to draw from.  Those are rebuilt 2 to 4 times before the block or head is trash.  There are no EV motors that are rebuilt once, much less 2 to 4 times.  The batteries cannot be rebuilt at all without completely tearing them apart and melting down all of the materials used to make them.  This is the underlying economics issue with disposable electronics.  The more of them that a "solution" requires, the faster they become an unsustainable environmental problem.

If you set a Cummins engine on fire, you can put it out with a garden hose.  You will never put a Tesla battery fire out with a garden hose.  You'll be lucky if a Lithium-ion battery fire doesn't damage the pavement under the vehicle.  If the fire started in a garage while charging at night, then you no longer have a home or a car.  You'll also be asleep when the battery is recharging, which means the electricity isn't coming from solar power or a wind turbine since those don't spin 24/7/365.

This is just silly and the proposition gets sillier the longer it goes on.  Whenever I see the photovoltaics and wind turbine farms, all I see are a bunch of monuments to the stupidity of man.  They all seem to say to me, "We're going to pretend that our energy usage will be what it was before industrialization while we all live like we're The Jetsons."

SpaceNut

Administrator

From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,428

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

Actually, some vehicles have battery packs that can be rebuilt or in this case the bad cells are removed, and the pack will be reoptimized for performance or reconditioned.

Gas engines can be rebuilt but if the heads have already failed you are too late much like the subaru's that I got rid of.

cells are the issue for battery packs as there is less of that being recycled.

A new life for your Nissan Leaf

https://www.wrightgrid.com/battery-reco … ing/prius/

class d extinguishers are used for metal burning to smother it.
https://fireextinguisherdepot.com/class … nguishers/

edit cell recycling

Some are collecting them, but others are looking to process them.
Recycling of lithium ion cells and batteries

There are two established recycling processes for lithium ion cells and batteries, using extremes of temperature. The Toxco process is designed for all types of lithium containing waste. The material is cooled in liquid nitrogen, before being mechanically shredded and mixed with water.

https://www.dnkpower.com/lithium-battery-recycling/

https://www.epa.gov/recycle/used-lithium-ion-batteries

https://www.lithionrecycling.com/

https://news.energysage.com/lithium-ion … recycling/

kbd512

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Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

SpaceNut,

Completely replacing parts is not rebuilding anything.  It's a parts replacement, plain and simple.  Virtually anything can be "rebuilt" by completely replacing it, but then again, words also have meanings.

SpaceNut

Administrator

From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,428

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

Of course car engines are not on a maintenance schedule for rebuilding but if you have enough money for multiple vehicles fora fleet use they could be but are they really worth the cost to do so.

A typical warranty on a rebuilt engine is for at least one year or 12,000 miles. Some engine repair specialists offer warranties as long as 36 months and unlimited miles

So how many thousand miles would you go with a new car before saying its time to rebuild the engine?

tahanson43206

Moderator

Registered: 2018-04-27

Posts: 19,263

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

Gents... the conversation seems to have drifted a bit ....

I'd like this topic to make steady progress toward laying out what it will take to make synthetic fuel with solar power.

It seems to me the overall framework was laid out by kbd512 some time ago.  Details need to be added, until there are enough in place to convince a funder the idea makes sense, and the leadership team is in place to follow through, from plans to working plant and on to a steady return to share holders.

It is my understanding that absolutely NOTHING has to be invented.  This ** should ** be a straight forward business development activity.

(th)

kbd512

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Registered: 2015-01-02

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Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

SpaceNut,

There are Model A engines that are still running in fully functional cars, because they've been rebuilt.

How many Lithium-ion batteries from the 1990s still function at all?

When excessive energy consumption is the root of the problem, then unlike Democrat economics, you can't "spend your way out of the problem", especially when what you're spending money on requires orders of magnitude more materials input per unit energy output and doesn't reliably output energy and never will.  Averaging power over time doesn't mean power is actually available at any given point in time, and that is the problem.

A passenger car with a gasoline engine will last 100,000 to 200,000 miles before it's time for a rebuild.  The more tech the engine is burdened with or the more horsepower it generates per cubic inch of displacement or the higher rpm it spins to in order to make rated power, the shorter the overhaul / rebuild interval.  If the engine is primarily made from cast iron and steel, then it can easily go 200,000 miles if it's a good basic design.  AMC / Chrysler Jeep straight-six engines were famous for high mileage prior to rebuild.  Some went as high as 300,000 miles and others as low as 175,000 miles.  I'm very well aware that not all engines are good designs, but exceptions don't disprove the rule.

If the engine is primarily Aluminum and plastic or only build strong enough to outlive its powertrain warranty period, the way Ford engines are built these days, then it may not even be worth rebuilding.  Stupid accounting tricks aside, all well-designed and built combustion engines will continue to outlive electric motors and batteries.  This is not because pistons are superior to electric motors in terms of reliability or power output per unit weight when both technologies are taken to their most refined forms.  I'm talking about gasoline piston engines vs Copper conductor electric motors, not nitro-methane or superconductors or similar utter nonsense that won't go into a passenger car for the masses.  Unfortunately, Ford is not the only auto maker that builds engines that way, so nearly all current EV motors are non-repairable disposable electronic devices.  That's not a knock on electric motors, because if they were made from cast iron and steel, then those could also last 30 years or several rebuilds, but then they would weigh more than a Big Block Chevy, which is why they're not used in EVs.

The batteries, at least in current form, are a lost cause.  No amount of ideology will remove their severe shortcomings, either.

kbd512

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Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

tahanson43206,

We keep drifting because "green ideology" keeps getting applied to basic math problems.  These people keep asserting that 2 plus 2 does not equal 4.  I'm here to ensure that 2 plus 2 is still equal to 4, whether ideology is for or against that "proposition"- as if that was "optional", dependent upon belief.

You are correct that this is not a "technology development project".  We will not be reinventing any wheels, nor "experimenting" with what might work slightly better while also being impossible to maintain or source materials for.  This is purely a money making proposition, not a science project.  We will polish steel collectors, set them out in the desert to start soaking up photons, pump in sea water and CO2, and make more liquid hydrocarbon fuels.

Practical energy storage that does not require insane pressures, cryogenics, or technology that doesn't exist is known by three words:

1. Gasoline
2. Diesel
3. Kerosene

There are no substitutes that come anywhere close to matching their energy density, which is why we use them so much.

SpaceNut

Administrator

From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,428

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

Apparently there is a fix for that driver that wants to much power and can not handle it
What Is Intelligent Speed Assist (ISA) & How Does It Work?

here are the carbon fuels and equations

https://en.delachieve.com/natural-gas-t … tural-gas/

https://kfs-solutions.com/application/w … -coal.html

http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/20 … .Ch.r.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerosene

https://www.diffen.com/difference/Diesel_vs_Petrol

When you google for seawater to gasoline you get hydrogen electrolysis for fuel

What we are wanting is a product that costs less to manufacture

https://www.topsoe.com/processes/synthe … o-gasoline

https://www.netl.doe.gov/research/coal/ … o-gasoline

https://cbe.statler.wvu.edu/files/d/791 … soline.pdf

These can be done with the experimental chambers and catalysts. There are no off the shelf units to buy.

Void

Member

Registered: 2011-12-29

Posts: 7,773

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

This might fit here, and perhaps be useful on Mars.

https://techxplore.com/news/2022-07-all … l-jet.html
Quote:

All-in-one solar-powered tower makes carbon-neutral jet fuel

I think that they produce first H2 & CO, so then that could be Methane, but I wonder how they reject the Oxygen?

Done.

Last edited by Void (2022-07-20 20:19:46)

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tahanson43206

Moderator

Registered: 2018-04-27

Posts: 19,263

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

For Void re #46

Outstanding find, Void! Thank you!

This appears to be the actual demonstration of the vision held by some of us, but I note that at ** this ** point, it is 4% efficient. On the other hand, I'm inclined to ask ... ? so what ? .... the power is free.  The output is aviation grade kerosene.

"This solar tower fuel plant was operated with a setup relevant to industrial implementation, setting a technological milestone towards the production of sustainable aviation fuels," Steinfeld says.

During a nine-day run of the plant reported in the paper, the solar reactor's energy efficiency—the portion of solar energy input that is converted into the energy content of the syngas produced—was around 4%. Steinfeld says his team is working intensively on improving the design to increase the efficiency to values over 15%. For example, they are exploring ways to optimize the ceria structure for absorbing solar radiation and developing methods to recover the heat released during the redox cycles.

(th)

kbd512

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Posts: 7,825

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

Void,

Excellent find.  Well, there it is ladies and gents.  A fuly functional solar thermal H2O + CO2 to Syngas to Methanol to Kerosene / Diesel solar reactor scaled up from a 4kW lab prototype to 50kW.  Next steps would be 1MW, followed by 150MW.  Ivanpah remains the largest solar power tower facility at 392MW, but uses 3 ~130MW power towers.  150MW has been done at Ouarzazate in Morocco and at Aurora in South Australia.

The idea would be to scatter these facilities across West Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, as well as Mexico, so that fuel supplies remain available so long as we receive sunlight.  There are no batteries in existence that come within a country mile of hydrocarbon fuels with respect to energy density.  Current EVs paltry 23% total efficiency increase over the latest combustion engines won't cut the mustard.  This is because 3X more energy is required to make each new EV, most of it from fossil fuels, most of the energy to recharge EVs comes from fossil fuels, and most of the manufactured components in EVs also consume fossil fuels.  At end-of-life, another 3X more energy is required to recycle each EV, or at least the battery portion of it, since there won't be any new Lithium-ion powered EVs without recycled batteries.  If dramatically more abundant battery materials are sourced, relative to Lithium and Cobalt, then small EV batteries combined with small combustion engines run at constant speed can do what neither technology can do alone- namely providing a much cleaner alternative to either straight hydrocarbon fuel or straight battery energy storage.

Like it or not, combustion engines are here to stay because there are precisely zero practical replacement options.  A battery that stores as much energy as a 6 pound gallon of gasoline weighs as much as a NFL linebacker.  Until a night-and-day difference in gravimetric and volumetric battery energy density materializes, this plan to wave our magic wand and transform all or most passenger cars, trucks, tractors, trains, ships, and aircraft into electric vehicles, is dead on arrival.

The success or failure of our energy future is dependent upon enough pragmatic people recognizing that engineering is limited by scientific knowledge reducible to repeatable practices.  It's not that I have some undying love for combustion engines, it's that my brain prefers solutions that actually work without a litany of ridiculous limitations that reduce the current en-vogue battery technology to something useless to humanity for powering much more than consumer electronic devices.  As of today, humanity is utterly clueless about how to make a battery that has the combination of characteristics that would make it a like-kind replacement for combustion engines.  That is not a matter of "good" or "bad", rather "it just is".

SpaceNut

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From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 29,428

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

Solar reflected 169 panels but there is no mention of the size that I have found as of yet.

We know from Moxie that after the scroll compressor that the electrolysis with membrane requires an 800'C temperature to disassociate the co2 into co + o2.

We know that electrolysis via electricity requires elevate temperatures to lower the power required to break the h2o bonds for h2 to become free.

We also know that an internal temperature of co + h2 in the reactor of 400 to 600 depending on the catalyst makes just about any flavor of product at the end.

The tracking of mirror reflection allows for a focused beam for a 9-hour period to make fuel. The target size is also hard to solve too as well.

The drawings all show the reactor at the ground level which would allow for cooling out of the bond breaking chambers.

edit
I did google with solar thermal fuel-production plant at IMDEA Energy Institute in Spain.

its got an abstract on the end of the void link

https://newatlas.com/energy/solar-jet-fuel-tower/

This pilot plant runs on concentrating solar thermal energy. One hundred and sixty-nine sun-tracking reflector panels, each presenting three square meters (~32 sq ft) of surface area, redirect sunlight into a 16-cm (6.3-in) hole in the solar reactor at the top of the 15-m-tall (49-ft) central tower. This reactor receives an average of about 2,500 suns' worth of energy – about 50 kW of solar thermal power.

This heat is used to drive a two-step thermochemical redox cycle. Water and pure carbon dioxide are fed in to a ceria-based redox reaction, which converts them simultaneously into hydrogen and carbon monoxide, or syngas. Because this is all being done in a single chamber, it's possible to tweak the rates of water and CO2 to live-manage the exact composition of the syngas.

This syngas is fed to a Gas-to-Liquid (GtL) unit at the bottom of the tower, which produced a liquid phase containing 16% kerosene and 40% diesel, as well as a wax phase with 7% kerosene and 40% diesel – proving that the ceria-based ceramic solar reactor definitely produced syngas pure enough for conversion into synthetic fuels.

Here is the chamber of which I had in my water from 1 ft depth topic.

tahanson43206

Moderator

Registered: 2018-04-27

Posts: 19,263

Re: Synthetic or Natural Fuel Produced using Solar Power

For SpaceNut re #49  ... thank you for research and analysis of the Spanish kerosene making operation.

There may well be patents issued for this sytem, if not already.  I'm assuming first recording would be in Spain, but the US and Europe would be given priority.

SearchTerm:solar power synthesis of kerosene
SearchTerm:kerosene synthesis of using solar power in Spain
SearchTerm:synthesis of kerosene using solar power

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