Organism Uses Solar Energy to Produce Hydrogen

Stan Freeman writes "CNET is reporting that Stanford University researchers have discovered a soil microorganism that splits water into hydrogen and oxygen. They are trying to adapt this naturally occurring anaerobic organism into one that can survive in a more normal environment. There is some more information on biological water splitting here on the National Renewable Energy Laboratory's (NREL) web site."

Comments

Do Hydrogen Cars Generate More CO2 Per Mile?

[Doug Dante]

Most Hydrogen generated today is made using Steam reforming of natural gas

This process produces "7.05 kg CO2 ... per [1.0] kilogram hydrogen".

Now new cars are getting near 140.9 [grams] C02 [per kilometer] (This is a target, double it if you want)

So, how many KGs of Hydrogen does a Hydrogen powered car need per mile? Multiply x7.05kg to get emissions based on current production technologies.

Are these hydrogen cars poisoning the planet? With a 500 km (310 miles) range, a gas powered car at the target level could sequester and store about 70 kgs (154 pounds) of CO2.

If gas stations were required to accept and sequester this CO2, we could effectively eliminate CO2 emissions from most new automobiles without criss crossing the world with Hydrogen delivery lines or developing a totally new CO2 free hydrogen creation system.

Just capture 50% of CO2 emissions and you'll be doing quite fine as far as cutting emissions goes.

This solves the biodiesel dead end?

[museumpeace]

We have read that ethanol is an energy dead-end using more energy than it delivers when all costs are included. Due to the fact that current biodiesel production processes need a vegtable oil feedstock, it too is a lousy energy source when all costs are considered.
But, U.Wisconsin chem researchers have a chemical [heat and catalysts, not bio-reactors] process that make biodiesel out of cellulose, which is 3/4 of dried plant material by weight . This means most of what farms [and cities too, if you count leaves and grass clippings] burn, bury or compost could be feedstock. Study the diagram...the UW process needs an H2 in-feed [it hydrogenates carbon chains to make the diesel, the H2 shown leaving the reactor is a fraction of what goes in]. So their process would be an energy winner if only a source of H2 that does not consume fossil fuel were available .

NREL, Stanford, meet U. Wisconsin. U. Wisconsin, meet Stanford and NREL. if you guys play nice together and don't play politics, maybe my grandchildren won't be bicycling to the library to read about an age when combustible hydrocarbon liquids were used to run selfpropelled vehicles.
I'd love to know exactly how credible the UW claims are. To whet the appetite of chemically knowledgible /.ers who might otherwise not have seen this article, their energy bottom line:

About 67 percent of the energy required to make ethanol is consumed in fermenting and distilling corn. As a result, ethanol production creates 1.1 units of energy for every unit of energy consumed. In the UW-Madison process, the desired alkanes spontaneously separate from water. No additional heating or distillation is required. The result is the creation of 2.2 units of energy for every unit of energy consumed in energy production.

I was so tempted to try posting the UW result when it came out but /. can't get forty comments on biology topics in 2 hours. [and they get over 900 on ethanol...go figure!] The eds like stories that get hundreds, not tens of responses. Is there a /. equivilent for sustainablity nerds?

Re:Cost measurements?

[linzeal]

It does not need to cost less than current forms of H energy either. All it needs to do is find a nitrate souce from a waste process that makes more money than the current use. Believe you me, there are so many different types of waste sources and uses that this is interesting just for that.