14 DAY TRIAL // The news of how one team of researchers from the UK succeeded in using air to make petrol just hit the online community, and it is causing quite a stir.
While skeptics are busy arguing that it all sounds too good to be true, the scientists behind this project claim that, since August until presently, the technology they developed allowed them to produce five liters of petrol from carbon dioxide and water vapors.
One does not have to be a specialist to realize that this breakthrough stands to tackle two major issues at the same time: removing CO2 from the atmosphere and taking the energy crisis off the table.
The official website for the company lets us in on all the science talk, which basically states that, by mixing air with sodium hydroxide, the scientists obtained a chemical compound known as sodium carbonate, from which pure CO2 can then be extracted.
Later on, the carbon dioxide is made to react with hydrogen, and viable fuels are just around the corner.
During a conference at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers in London, Peter Harrison, the chief executive for Air Fuel Synthesis, explained their achievement in a straightforward way, “We've taken carbon dioxide from air and hydrogen from water and turned these elements into petrol,” The Independent reads.
Although, for the time being, the electricity they have used to power up these chemical reactions is being provided by fossil fuels, the researchers hope that they will soon switch to renewables, thus greening up their working agenda even further.
According to the same source, it will only take about two years before the idea is implemented on a much larger scale, and a commercial plant is built.
Should things go as planned, this technology could lead to a ton of petrol being produced daily.
“We think that by the end of 2014, provided we can get the funding going, we can be producing petrol using renewable energy and doing it on a commercial basis,” company representatives said.