【】

A group of U.S. scientists has discovered a way to turn carbon dioxide, a planet-warming greenhouse gas, into a cleaner-burning motor fuel.
The electrochemical process could be used in waste-to-fuel technologies that transform carbon emissions from coal and natural gas power plants into ethanol, according to scientists at the Energy Department's Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.
The team published their findings last week in the journal ChemistrySelect.
SEE ALSO:Here's why the new agreement on 'super greenhouse gases' is a huge dealTheir process turns carbon dioxide into ethanol with little more than extremely tiny spikes of carbon and copper.
Adam Rondinone, the study's lead author and a scientist at Oak Ridge, said they stumbled onto this process nearly by accident.
"We were trying to study the first step of a proposed reaction, when we realized that the catalyst was doing the entire reaction on its own," Rondinone said in an Oak Ridge press release.
"Ethanol was a surprise -- it’s extremely difficult to go straight from carbon dioxide to ethanol with a single catalyst," he added.
Rondinone and his colleagues used a catalyst made from carbon, copper and nitrogen and then applied voltage. This triggered a complicated chemical reaction that reversed the combustion process.
Applying these techniques to a solution of carbon dioxide dissolved into water, the scientists produced ethanol with a yield of 63 percent. Typically, this type of electrochemical reaction would result in a mix of different fuels in small amounts, according to Oak Ridge.

The researchers said they plan to further study the catalyst's properties and behavior and will refine their approach to boost the overall production rate of ethanol.
Rondinone suggested the process could be used not only for fossil fuel power plants but also renewable energy systems. He said the excess electricity from wind and solar plants could be stored as ethanol -- which grid operators could then burn when the wind wanes or the sun sets.
"This could help to balance a grid supplied by intermittent renewable sources," he said in the press release.
Existing vehicle fleets, and even some aircraft, are capable of using motor fuel containing a mix of ethanol. However, one of the main ethanol production processes in use today, which relies on deriving the fuel from corn, actually aggravates global warming rather than helping to solve it.
TopicsSustainability
相关文章
Katy Perry talks 'Rise,' her next batch of songs, and how to survive Twitter
Katy Perry recently surpassed 90 million followers on Twitter, making her the person with the most f2025-04-03- 輔酶q10是一個在全世界都十分時興的保健產品 ,具備抗氧化性的功效 ,也可以維護心腦血管病的身心健康 ,遭受了很多人的毫無疑問 ,現階段國外的公司和我國的公司都是有生產者的商品 ,自然顧客都期盼購到最好是的商品2025-04-03
- 國羽半決賽占據7個席位 !男單 、女單 、女雙有望包攬冠亞軍_羽毛球 - 世界杯,歐洲杯 ,天下體育,足球 ,世界杯,籃球,羽球,乒乓球 ,球類, 棒球 ( 組合,半決賽 )www.ty42.com 日期:202025-04-03
OpenAI's Sam Altman and Greg Brockman respond to safety leader resignation
This week, OpenAI's co-head of the "superalignment" team (which overlooks the company's safety issue2025-04-03Aly Raisman catches Simone Biles napping on a plane like a champion
Simone Biles is exhausted. She won five medals at the Summer Olympics in Rio, posed for selfies with2025-04-03- 每一個父母都期待自身的小孩可以身心健康生長發育 ,可是小孩在成長階段中 ,因為飲食不規律會造成 鈣的缺失狀況。大家都應當了解鈣元素是推動骨骼生長關鍵的物質,長期性鈣的缺失不但會造成 小孩的免疫力低下 ,還會2025-04-03
最新评论