A Coal-Fired Power Plant In India Is Turning Carbon Dioxide Into Baking Soda (technologyreview.com)

schwit1 quotes a report from MIT Technology Review: In the southern Indian city of Tuticorin, locals are unlikely to suffer from a poorly risen cake. That's because a coal-fired thermal power station in the area captures carbon dioxide and turns it into baking soda. Carbon capture schemes are nothing new. Typically, they use a solvent, such as amine, to catch carbon dioxide and prevent it from escaping into the atmosphere. From there, the CO2 can either be stored away or used. But the Guardian reports that a system installed in the Tuticorin plant uses a new proprietary solvent developed by the company Carbon Clean Solutions. The solvent is reportedly just slightly more efficient than those used conventionally, requiring a little less energy and smaller apparatus to run. The collected CO2 is used to create baking soda, and it claims that as much as 66,000 tons of the gas could be captured at the plant each year. Its operators say that the marginal gain in efficiency is just enough to make it feasible to run the plant without a subsidy. In fact, it's claimed to be the first example of an unsubsidized industrial plant capturing CO2 for use. schwit1 notes: "A 'climate change' project that doesn't involve taxpayer dollars? Is that even allowed?"

Comments

"captured"

[Anonymous Coward]

Unless they are then entombing the baking soda beneath the earth's crust, this is not really a "capture" of carbon dioxide.

Re: "captured"

[PatientZero]

When the cops announce they've nabbed a bank-robber, do you only consider him captured if they killed him in the process? Your standards seem either not well thought out or simply unrealistic.

If the cops nab a bank robber and then release him, I don't consider him captured. Jail would suffice; I don't see that execution is necessary.

Are you inhaling the baking soda? Is it floating in the atmosphere helping insulate the planet?

Carbon from fossil fuels is captured only if it is prevented from entering the atmosphere. If the baking soda is used for, y'know, baking—and then those baked goods are eaten—the carbon will end up in the atmosphere. In other words, not captured.

Re:"captured"

[slashrio]

As soon as you use the baking soda in baking a cake or in neutralizing the acidity of ascorbic acid by mixing it with baking soda (2 g ascorbic acid : 1 g baking soda) then the CO2 will be liberated again. So no, it's not really 'permanent' capturing.
However, if the traditional way of making baking soda (I'm too lazy to look that up) involves burning fuel in order to get the CO2, then it is better to use the already produced CO2 from the coal fired plant.
And you don't even need specifically a coal fired plant, any fossil fuel burning plant will do. I guess this is partly meant to make coal look a bit better.

Re:"captured"

[Trailer Trash]

As soon as you use the baking soda in baking a cake or in neutralizing the acidity of ascorbic acid by mixing it with baking soda (2 g ascorbic acid : 1 g baking soda) then the CO2 will be liberated again.

Which people are doing either way - therefore this is a net win. Period.

Baking soda also has a lot of other uses that don't involve being turned back into CO2 and salt - I use it as a prewash in my dishwasher, for example. As a matter of fact, all of the uses on the back of the Arm & Hammer bag are pretty much the same as that.

Re: "captured"

[amRadioHed]

If this baking soda is used for baking instead of baking soda mined from natural deposits than it will result in less carbon added to the atmosphere.

Re: "captured"

[BronsCon]

Now THAT would be a hell of a kitchen volcano!

Then they put the baking soda into coal mines!

[jfdavis668]

They will be making so much baking soda that they will have to put it back in coal mines to get rid of it.

Re:Then they put the baking soda into coal mines!

[R3d M3rcury]

Which is all well and good until the vinegar factory starts dumping their excess in the coal mine.

Cue mdsolar

[raymorris]

Cue mdsolar to tell us why capturing CO2 is bad (for his business).

Re:Cue mdsolar

[BlueStrat]

Cue mdsolar to tell us why capturing CO2 is bad (for his business).

Why, could you begin to imagine the results of a railroad tanker-car full of vinegar derailing and causing a spill that hit that 66,000 tons of baking soda!?!?! Do you even realize how many science-fair volcanoes that would equal!?!?! My God, the humanity!

Strat

So wait, where do they get the sodium?

[NotSoHeavyD3]

Since it's sodium bicarbonate. I guess they could get it from sea water but then I'd wonder what happens to the left over chloride ions.

What was that last parting shot at the end for?

[rsilvergun]

For one thing, it's got nothing to do with climate change. This is kinda like why I oppose nuclear: it needs to be cheaper and more profitable to do the _right_ thing than the wrong thing or unregulated businesses will do the wrong thing. Every. Figgin. Time. If they didn't they'd be run out of business by the guy who did (and used the cost savings to under cut them).

This is what we sometimes call a "Happy Accident". Like all such things I'm highly skeptical. Anyone want to shoot holes in it? e.g. what other industrial run offs might they have that they're not mentioning...

66000 tons of CO2 would produce 126000 Tons NaHCO3

[wizzerking]

66000 tons is 59874192840 grams of CO2 Divide by the molecular weight of CO2 of 44g/mole or 1360777110 moles of CO2 per year If this process uses teh standard process of converting CO2 to NaHCO3 CO2 + 2 NaOH -> Na2CO3 + H20 Na2CO3 + CO2 + H2O -> 2NaHCO3 Then for every mole of CO2 converted there is also 1 mole of NaHCO3 which has a molecular weight of 88 grams per mole so Converting 66000 tons of CO2 to NaHCO3 will result in 1360777110 moles * 84 g/Mole = 114305277240 grams NaHCO3 or 126,000 tons per year According to http://www.madehow.com/Volume-... only 32000 tons were sold in 1990 a decrease from previous sales So the NaHCO3 produced from THIS ONE PLANT WOULD INCREASE THE WORLD NEED FOR SALES BY NEARLY 400% so yep we are going to be burying this NaHCO3 SOMEWHERE THERE IS NO MARKET AT THIS TIME

Gonna have to bury it somewhere

[caseih]

This is a good start as finding a stable way to store the carbon is always helpful. But we can't use this baking soda for cooking as that would release much/all of this carefully-stored carbon.

But it's good to have a process that can turn CO2 into something useful. Now if we could just make a closed- carbon loop for energy production we'd be golden. CO2 + renewable energy -> fuel -> work -> CO2. Nothing wrong with burning carbon if it's carbon that was already in the atmosphere (ignoring NOx and particulates).

Sorry, I wasn't being clear

[rsilvergun]

I don't like nuclear because it's cheaper to run an unsafe plant than a safe one. Sooner or later the factory gets privatized in the name of saving money, maintenance gets put off or cut entirely and there's a disaster. This is exactly what happened in Fukushima. The best part? The CEO cried a little on TV and all was forgiven. The man should rot in jail for eternity, but we don't spill the blood of kings.

Re:Sorry, I wasn't being clear

[AmiMoJo]

Actually three former execs are being prosecuted over the Fukushima disaster. It has taken a long time to gather evidence and build a case, but hopefully there will eventually be jail time for those guys.

That's nice

[Namarrgon]

Kudos for finding a new use for some of the excess CO2, but it's still only a tiny fraction of the plant's CO2 output.

Given an estimated 13 million tonnes of CO2 emitted annually (based on the 14.9 million tonnes emitted by the 1200 MW Chandrapur plant), then capturing 66 kilotonnes still allows 99.5% of the CO2 to escape.

Re:66000 tons of CO2 would produce 126000 Tons NaH

[Plus1Entropy]

Guess which gas gets produced when baking soda reacts with an acid?

Let's look at how much they are using/making

[justthinkit]

CO2
44 g/mole

Baking Soda
NaHCO3
84 g/mole

NaOH
40 g/mole

The reaction is CO2 + NaOH => NaHCO3

So 44 g CO2 + 40 g NaOH => 84 g NaHCO3

So to capture 66,000 tons of CO2, you need 10/11*66,000 tons of NaOH (i.e. 60,000 tons) and you get 126,000 tons of soap.

Lets say a family of four uses 1/4 pound of soap per month. This would make enough soap for 100,000,000
people (each month/indefinitely).

Bulk cost of NaOH is $125/ton, so the 60,000 tons of NaOH needed would cost $7,500,000.

Re:Let's look at how much they are using/making

[The Bender]

And don't forget that NaOH is produced industrially by electrolysis of seawater. Using electricity. From power stations... that produce CO2, etc, etc.

Re:Let's look at how much they are using/making

[silentcoder]

Assuming they could capture all the CO2 - that would equal 2/3 of the total annual baking soda production world wide. Two of these and (since it's a secondary business which can afford to undercut) they can put every baking soda factory on earth out of business.... three and we have a problem of what the fuck to do with all that excess baking soda ?

Would not use the product for food production

[ZombieEngineer]

Pretty much all fossil fuels have some level of sulfur (if not - it commands a price premium and unlikely to be used for electrical power generation).

The sulfur would end up in the stack as sulfur dioxide with is likely to be scrubbed out as sodium sulfite (not sulfate). Sulfites salts have various health issues for some people.

I am struggling to see a market for the sodium bicarbonate unless this is a variation of the Solvay process (sodium chloride + calcium carbonate => sodium carbonate + calcium chloride), unfortunately the Solvay process is not without waste products.

where does it go?

[AndyKron]

Where does the CO2 go after the baking soda is used?