Technology
Germany based Sunfire GmbH have created a machine that can convert water and carbon dioxide taken from the air into synthetic petroleum-based fuels such as petrol, diesel and kerosene. The tech could be a much needed step towards phasing out the use of pricey, finite fossil fuels.
Sunfire-Makes-Fuel-from-Water-and-CO2-in-Air-770x350[Image courtesy of Sunfire]
Sunfire have developed a method to produce the fuels cleanly and also uses electricity from renewable sources such as wind and solar. They say the machine currently operates at an efficiency of around 50%, but seem confident this can be increased to 70%.
The process works by creating steam via electricity from renewable sources and removing the oxygen to produce hydrogen. Carbon dioxide is then pulled from the atmosphere to be reduced to carbon monoxide, and used with the hydrogen in the Fischer-Tropsch process (chemical reactions that convert the carbon monoxide and hydrogen into liquid hydrocarbons). Sunfire dubs this “Power-to-Liquid” technology.
Sunfire-Makes-Fuel-from-Water-and-CO2-in-Air5[Image courtesy of Sunfire]
Excess heat is re-used in the production of steam to improve efficiency. At its current stage, the machine can produce a barrel of fuel per day. The cost of designing and building the rig was “seven figures”, half of which came from public funding received from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research.
“This rig enables us to prove technical feasibility on an industrial scale,” Sunfire CTO Christian von Olshausen told CNET. “It is now a matter of regulatory factors falling into place in a way which gives investors a sufficient level of planning reliability. Once that has occurred it will be possible to commence the step-by-step substitution of fossil fuels. If we want to achieve fuel autonomy in the long term, we need to get started today.”
With that in mind, the companies website claims that “steam electrolysis is due to be available from 2016 onwards.”